Forced Boycotting for community
This game is something I’ve been excited about for a couple years now. Glad it’s out, but horrified to find that it’s just riddled with the classic Niantic pay to play system even though they advertise as a free to play creatures breeding game. Oh btw if you got the game intending on playing it as it was designed, prepare to have to pay to do so. Promises of grandeur never come to fruition from Niantic, all they want is to mine your data while you mindlessly tap your screen and pay them to do so.
This game is flailing in the water on release, many features available in beta testing have been removed or switch to pay to access them. Niantic reworked this app to line their own pockets so badly that the entire community is boycotting nest purchases and any other payable feature they’ve surprised us with after release. The community as a whole plans to allow this game to die off if Niantic doesn’t fix their pricing and treatment of their players. I heavily suggest anyone planning on getting this game, seek out their discord server first that way you can get real honest player info from other players and the community.
This game is flailing in the water on release, many features available in beta testing have been removed or switch to pay to access them. Niantic reworked this app to line their own pockets so badly that the entire community is boycotting nest purchases and any other payable feature they’ve surprised us with after release. The community as a whole plans to allow this game to die off if Niantic doesn’t fix their pricing and treatment of their players. I heavily suggest anyone planning on getting this game, seek out their discord server first that way you can get real honest player info from other players and the community.
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Great Idea, Poor Execution
The game is cute and cool. Hatch a little monster, play with it and feed it, get it to grow up. That’s pretty much it. Then when you want to have more little monsters, you’re stuck paying $5 each time you want a new one.
There is absolutely no way to play this game for more than a day or two without paying. Also lots of bugs where your friends won’t load, buddy gets stuck doing something. I’ve had to reboot a few dozen times over a couple hours. Battery drain is insane, AR is constantly on and there’s no way to not play in AR, which kills batteries. And if you accept a friend request in this game from a stranger wanting to breed monsters, Niantic automatically adds them to all other Niantic games as well.
Lots of cool ideas, but honestly a lot of this functionality would have been better just being added to PoGo.
There is absolutely no way to play this game for more than a day or two without paying. Also lots of bugs where your friends won’t load, buddy gets stuck doing something. I’ve had to reboot a few dozen times over a couple hours. Battery drain is insane, AR is constantly on and there’s no way to not play in AR, which kills batteries. And if you accept a friend request in this game from a stranger wanting to breed monsters, Niantic automatically adds them to all other Niantic games as well.
Lots of cool ideas, but honestly a lot of this functionality would have been better just being added to PoGo.
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Even without breeding I still enjoy the simulation aspects
I’m an 80s kid and as I entered middle school Tamagotchi back in the 90s was all the rage. I miss the Tamagotchi Connect app. There is a new Tamagotchi coming soon but until that happens Peridot is the next best thing. Plus it promotes healthy active lifestyles and as a gamer that’s something I struggle a lot with. So anything that makes walking or exercising fun is good! I am sad that they removed foraging for nests and agree nest prices are too high. I enjoy the AR aspects watching my Peridot interact with my real pets and friends and family and explore my world. Oh and I love how they all look completely one of a kind! That’s the best part and still even without breeding your one Peridot is still one of a kind! And that’s awesome. I love how they purr when you pet them and feeding them and dressing them up and teaching them tricks. I will keep playing until the end, but without breeding and losing players by the thousands each day, that end is very near. For that reason I won’t spend real life money on the game cuz it’s going to die soon sadly.
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Fun but gets boring
So aside the current hate from the existing community, I gave this game a chance.
First off while the permanent AR gameplay is kinda fun, definitely kills battery. On my iPhone 14 Pro Max, 30 mins gameplay drains about 20% of battery.
Walking on the street with constant AR and camera pointing is awkward, guess it’s more like sitting down in park kinda game but then again, battery!!
Gameplay sweet and cute, but on the 2nd day the feed-fetch-trick-forage sequence gets super boring. You reach adulthood with your Dot in about 48 hours then you ready to breed and hatch new ones, which is the core of the game BUT to hatch an egg you NEED a nest EACH time costing you £4.99 or with certain bundles.
So essentially you only can buy new pets if you want and after 48 hours you just end up with a battery draining glorified tamagotchi.
Hit and miss for me, would be less bitter if exciting community wouldn’t feel like they were just milked for cash.
First off while the permanent AR gameplay is kinda fun, definitely kills battery. On my iPhone 14 Pro Max, 30 mins gameplay drains about 20% of battery.
Walking on the street with constant AR and camera pointing is awkward, guess it’s more like sitting down in park kinda game but then again, battery!!
Gameplay sweet and cute, but on the 2nd day the feed-fetch-trick-forage sequence gets super boring. You reach adulthood with your Dot in about 48 hours then you ready to breed and hatch new ones, which is the core of the game BUT to hatch an egg you NEED a nest EACH time costing you £4.99 or with certain bundles.
So essentially you only can buy new pets if you want and after 48 hours you just end up with a battery draining glorified tamagotchi.
Hit and miss for me, would be less bitter if exciting community wouldn’t feel like they were just milked for cash.
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Forced Paywall and destroys your battery life
First thing you’ll find, you need nests to hatch Peridots, you get one for free as a new player and then you have to pay £4.99 per time. So unless you like being fleeced, you’ll only ever have 2 peridots and can’t breed them. Pointless. There is no grinding option to get these nests (there was in the beta but that’s been removed - I wonder why?!). So there is literally nothing going for this game beyond the first breeding unless you pay. If that’s going to be the case, the price needs to be more reasonable - 99p would be more realistic. I’m not spending £5 a time and I sure as hell wouldn’t let my kids spend £5 a time!
Other than that, it destroys your battery life. It actually made my iPhone 14 get so hot it displayed a warning on the screen - I’ve never seen that before! It also runs a full battery to flat in around 45mins to an hour of use.
The AR elements of the game are very good and work well and that’s obviously where the power goes - but an option to turn them off when simply playing or feeding would really help, as would a low power mode.
I so wanted to love this game, and I probably would if it wasn’t forcibly paywalled in the way that it is.
Rated ⭐️⭐️ for the great use of AR but otherwise it’s a one-star hustle.
Other than that, it destroys your battery life. It actually made my iPhone 14 get so hot it displayed a warning on the screen - I’ve never seen that before! It also runs a full battery to flat in around 45mins to an hour of use.
The AR elements of the game are very good and work well and that’s obviously where the power goes - but an option to turn them off when simply playing or feeding would really help, as would a low power mode.
I so wanted to love this game, and I probably would if it wasn’t forcibly paywalled in the way that it is.
Rated ⭐️⭐️ for the great use of AR but otherwise it’s a one-star hustle.
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Core mechanic locked behind paywall
Had a lot of fun raising my first Dot, kept getting told that my Dot would want to breed and hatch it's own Dots. Well then I find out you have to pay $5 to buy a Nest which allows you to breed. And you can fully raise a Dot to adulthood in one day so if you want to keep breeding that's at least $5 a day. You get one free Nest but that's it. Plus there's not much to do with Dots once they reach adulthood except breed them. Also, the game has achievements in which you try to get specific combinations of traits, which you must breed for.
Niantic touted that there's 2 trillion billion combinations of Dots, but they all have the exact same body - 4 legs and a weird cat/llama body. The colors, patterns, horns etc are cool though. Just wished there were more than 1 body type.
I'll raise my first Dot and the free Hatch but I'm not going to pay a dime for what seems like a core mechanic of this game. Feels like a cash grab or like they wanted to make an NFT game and just pushed this out instead.
Niantic touted that there's 2 trillion billion combinations of Dots, but they all have the exact same body - 4 legs and a weird cat/llama body. The colors, patterns, horns etc are cool though. Just wished there were more than 1 body type.
I'll raise my first Dot and the free Hatch but I'm not going to pay a dime for what seems like a core mechanic of this game. Feels like a cash grab or like they wanted to make an NFT game and just pushed this out instead.
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The MAIN feature of the game is pay-walled
This game is super cute and has great potential BUT the main feature of the game (breeding and collecting dots) is paywalled. You get one single free nest when you start and then it’s $5 per nest ($7 Canadian) which is outrageous. This means you get to breed one new dot for free and then any more you have to pay, and pay a lot, if you want to keep and collect the new dots that you’re breeding.
$1 per nest would be totally acceptable but $5 is exorbitant (in the beta there was a way to farm items used to make nests). There has to be a free to play friendly way to get nests for this game to be even remotely successful. I’m writing this the day after launch so I’m really hoping they smarten up and rework this or this game is going to tank.
$1 per nest would be totally acceptable but $5 is exorbitant (in the beta there was a way to farm items used to make nests). There has to be a free to play friendly way to get nests for this game to be even remotely successful. I’m writing this the day after launch so I’m really hoping they smarten up and rework this or this game is going to tank.
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Its a start. Currently, barebones.
Its a cute game with basic barebones features like playing with your AR pet, breeding it with other “Dots” such as random people’s near by or else where. Theres not much besides that. Like, literally nothing else.
Game is a battery hog so expect it to drain your phone quickly on a walk. It also will keep an apartment block well heated in the winter months with how hot it makes your phone.
A handful of bugs but that is expected. Nothing “game breaking”
However, it is sad to see features in here that could have been in Pokemon Go like playing fetch with your pokemon. Having it roll around as you pet it. Digging for stuff. Basic “pet” things. But thats a review for PoGo, their 8 year old dying game lost behind corporate greed.
Will we see the same for this game as we did with Niantics 4 other attempts? Such as Pikman, Harry Potter, NBA, That weird Pogo clone, etc? Who knows. Time will tell.
Just understand going into this game Niantic has a very poor track record.
All in all; I would like to see this game have an actual life built around it. Not dumped in 8 months like the other Niantic titles. It has potential to be a fun catch em all type game but currently its very basic and empty.
Game is a battery hog so expect it to drain your phone quickly on a walk. It also will keep an apartment block well heated in the winter months with how hot it makes your phone.
A handful of bugs but that is expected. Nothing “game breaking”
However, it is sad to see features in here that could have been in Pokemon Go like playing fetch with your pokemon. Having it roll around as you pet it. Digging for stuff. Basic “pet” things. But thats a review for PoGo, their 8 year old dying game lost behind corporate greed.
Will we see the same for this game as we did with Niantics 4 other attempts? Such as Pikman, Harry Potter, NBA, That weird Pogo clone, etc? Who knows. Time will tell.
Just understand going into this game Niantic has a very poor track record.
All in all; I would like to see this game have an actual life built around it. Not dumped in 8 months like the other Niantic titles. It has potential to be a fun catch em all type game but currently its very basic and empty.
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Pay to Win! On day 1!
In a game about breeding Dots, so you can real se them into the wild, to save the Dot population, you guessed it, you gotta breed! But niantic wants their cut every single time! The ONLY way to breed is with two adult dots and a nest. The ONLY way to get nests is paying money to Niantic. $5 per next, and they’re single use. There is no other way.
Not to mention that the game has been stripped to bare bones compared to beta there is nothing to do. You can’t grind tricks because your dot will refuse the food, you can make your dot too tired to play, you can’t breed without paying so once they grow up that’s it.
I was excited about this game for the past year since I didn’t make it into the beta, and now I’m disappointed. Don’t waste your memory space or money. The devs refuse to even notice the community’s cries, they have stripped the game to digging up sandwiches, they say breeding isn’t actually an important part of the game, and are slowly removing more traits from Dots to lessen complexity. It’s not worth it unless you have just tons of money to blow to be able to play it.
Not to mention that the game has been stripped to bare bones compared to beta there is nothing to do. You can’t grind tricks because your dot will refuse the food, you can make your dot too tired to play, you can’t breed without paying so once they grow up that’s it.
I was excited about this game for the past year since I didn’t make it into the beta, and now I’m disappointed. Don’t waste your memory space or money. The devs refuse to even notice the community’s cries, they have stripped the game to digging up sandwiches, they say breeding isn’t actually an important part of the game, and are slowly removing more traits from Dots to lessen complexity. It’s not worth it unless you have just tons of money to blow to be able to play it.
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Over glorified and expensive Tamagotchi
Fair warning, this game was developed by Niantic for the sole purpose of collecting your data and selling it to the highest bidder. They have a history of producing buggy software, nerfing popular features, and unfairly banning accounts when users ask for help. They blatantly ignore their most dedicated users and refuse to provide any support. As far as gameplay goes, it's mediocre at best and is very expensive to progress. There is no reasonable 'Free to Play' option with this game. After the initial phase, you will need to purchase a 'nest' for $5 to progress, creating an unavoidable paywall. It also consumes a ton of resources - my iPhone 13 Max heats up after only 10 minutes of play, and after 15 minutes of play, I have to close the game to allow my device to cool down. As a result of being such a resource hog, the performance is choppy and difficult to play. I will continue to play for a little while longer for a proper assessment, but I doubt this will be a keeper for me.
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