Pokemon GO Fest Will Return, CEO Promises Not To Make Last Years Mistakes

Pokemon GO is easily one of the biggest cultural phenomena we’ve ever seen in the world of video games. For the moment it came out, EVERYONE wanted a piece of it. Yet, that caused problems, because with EVERYONE having it, the servers could only handle so much. However, developer Niantic persevered, and not only stabilized everything, they showed just how successful the game can be. Thus, they made a special event called the Pokemon GO Fest, a chance to bring all the players together for a big event in Chicago…and it failed horribly.

Now, it didn’t fail because it didn’t have enough people, it had a full house. but, they were unprepared for what that would bring. Because of that, the day was filled with disappointment and anger, and a lawsuit was actually filed against Niantic (and was settled) because of the incident. You’d think that would lead Niantic to not do the event again. But you would be wrong, the Pokemon GO Fest will return to Chicago this year on July 14th and 15th.

In a chat with IGN, Niantic CEO John Hanke talked about the failures of last years event and how this year would be different. Including how a similar event in Japan last year helped teach Niantic on how to host events in the future:

“A large portion of that event was a walking course that was set up along the waterfront in Yokohama, and it worked really well. It was super fun. People were moving and not standing still, which is actually more in line with our mission. At an event where people are kind of all clumped together in a group, there’s less room to move around.”

The now two-day Pokemon GO Fest in Chicago will feature a 1.8 mile walking course, so you can move around as you try and catch all the special Pokemon at the event. As for coverage, Hanke said the team is taking steps to ensure that things don’t get messed up this time.

“All of the major carriers are deploying COWs (Cells on Wheels), so there will be mobile network hotspots from all the major carriers set up in such a way that we believe we will have full coverage, efficient coverage, for everybody throughout the park.”

We’ll have to wait and see whether these adjustments do indeed change things for the event.