Pokemon GO designer explains why the game “isn’t perfect”

There’s a significant amount of elements in Pokemon GO that could be improved. That’s according to Niantic designer Dennis Hwang, who recently explained why the popular mobile game “isn’t perfect” and what he would change about its design. “Oh, there’s a lot that isn’t perfect. We had a pretty tight timeline to build this,” Hwang said in an interview with The Verge. “I think just generally speaking the biggest element we’re looking to improve is allowing more heads-up play. It saddens me a little bit when I see a lot of hunched over people outside. They’re having fun, they’re outside in a great public park, but we’re always wanting a little more direct engagement with our immediate surroundings. So those are design choices we’re looking at carefully to keep improving it.

“Like let’s say in the current interface, some of the information about a pokémon that spawned is in fine detail and the icon is really small. It’s going to make you go closer to the screen. We may just iterate on the design until you feel like the information is being presented to you in a way where you’re not having to stick your nose on the screen. It could be a simple size change, or the way the notification is animated, or it could be auditory cues instead of visual cues. There are a lot of options we’re going to explore.”