Like a poor young suckling puppy being torn from its mother, millions of Pokémon GO players are unable to log in, or take part, in their favourite mobile game. Reports are coming from all around the world that the game is down. POGO is no-go.
This most devastating of news broke first in my son’s bedroom, where he wailed that he was unable to find a battle partner, when he was just six successful battles away from completing the ridiculous 128 battle challenge. Heading to Down Detector, it was apparent he wasn’t alone. And then on Twitter, the same was being reported from many countries.
From Australia to the Netherlands to the UK to China, tweets are flying about lamenting the loss of the game, especially from those who were supposed to be enjoying their Wednesday Raid Hour. Others have found they’ve just lost premium items, like Lucky Eggs and Incenses, used just before the servers went down.
As is frustratingly often the case, the last people to publicly notice are Niantic. At the time of writing, both the @PokemonGoApp and @NianticHelp accounts remain blissfully unaware of the issues, both promoting next weekend’s GO Fest, despite the barrages of incoming tweets to both accounts. (It’s clearly still bedtime in the US, but you’d imagine such accounts, certainly the latter, would be staffed 24 hours.)
Those logged in before things went wrong are still finding some aspects working, but many not. Those trying to log in are all hitting the same point on the (brand new) intro screen’s loading bar, and then nothing.
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The best response I’ve seen so far is from ProfGenieHwang, lamenting that Korea’s Raid Hour has been impossible to play, along with the perfect GIF.
So yes, it’s not just you. We’ll update this post as soon as things are back online, but just wanted to reassure you that Niantic isn’t picking on you personally. Just for God’s sake don’t click “Sign Out” or you’ll have to remember a password you haven’t put in for nine months.
We’ve contacted Niantic to ask what’s up, and will let you know as soon as we know more.