Interview with Niantic’s Kawashima

An article was recently released in Japan, with an interview with Kawashima of Niantic. This article was full of interesting tidbits so we’ve collected translation segments that seem interesting.

The article starts off explaining that on April 7, Pokémon GO had monthly active users at 65 million people then immediately jumps into the interview.

 

Overview

  • Niantic Japan has a new office.
  • 91 shards traveled 640,000 km or 16 laps of the Earth
    • Enlightened moved 370,000 km
    • Resistance 270,000 km
  • “Ingress is going to change more and more, various formats” – Mr. Kawashima

 

Operation Portal Recon

  • Operation Portal Recon will be available in Japan for agents L15 and L16 on April 12th
  • 9,000 new portals added as result of OPR, while 11,000 portals dismissed (rejected)
  • Portal Recon affects Pokémon GO as well as Ingress and entire product of Niantic

 

Ingress 2.0

  • Ingress is a very important product for Niantic
  • 2.0 is coming within the year
    • May be faster depending on testing
  • UI and Illustrations are changing (fresh feeling as said by Mr. Kawashima)
  • Ingress adopts Unity much like Pokémon GO
    • 3D space will be much more interesting

 

Ingress Wearable

  • Want to adapt and make things like Pokémon GO Plus which is more wearable

 

Pokémon GO

  • Engineers are working hard for new features (Hints at Multiplayer battle)