When it comes to combining real-life exploration and gamification, perhaps nobody has done as well as Niantic, the folks behind the ever-popular Pokémon GO. However, even that supposed success has not stopped the company from feeling the pressures of ensuring its finances are in order and profitable.
The latest announcement from Niantic is anything but positive, with the company closing its Los Angeles studio for games, as well as cancelling its upcoming Marvel game and shuttering the NBA-related one. This will see the cutting of 230 jobs, or 25% of its staff in order to help stabilise the company’s finances.
“We have allowed our expenses to grow faster than revenue,” Chief Executive Officer John Hanke said in an email to employees. “New projects in games and platforms have not delivered revenues commensurate with those investments.”
The cancellation of Marvel World of Heroes and the closing down of NBA All-World will allow Niantic to focus on its main revenue generator, Pokémon GO. The game will soon celebrate its seventh birthday and continues to bring in close to $1 billion in revenue each year. In contrast, the poor performance of the NBA game made it a target, with just over 350,000 downloads in the first week of launch, which pales in comparison to recent titles like Pikmin Bloom and Peridot, which had about 1 million downloads in the first week.
Those worried about Monster Hunter Now can rest easy, though, as the collaboration with Capcom remains a priority project for the company. Niantic remains “long-term believers in augmented reality as the future form factor for computing,” Hanke added.
Niantic will also look to devices like Meta Quest Pro and Apple Vision Pro to help refine its vision of bringing augmented reality to more people in more useful ways. Whether that would mean just gaming remains to be seen.
Jake is a full-time trophy hunter and achievement gatherer on consoles, and part-time Steam Sale victim. He has a thing for Batman and awesome statues, and running out of space for both. Send help.
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