'Pokemon Go' Creator Niantic Teases Audio Integration For Next Augmented Reality Game

Niantic, the developer behind “Pokemon Go,” has revealed that it’s working on its next augmented reality (AR) game. Unlike “Pokemon Go,” the company’s next AR mobile game will apparently provide a new experience that relies on audio.

Niantic CTO Phil Keslin sat down and discussed the company’s next AR game during TechCrunch’s Disrupt San Francisco event. During the panel, Keslin spoke about the problems of AR games like “Pokemon Go,” which requires players to awkwardly hold up their phones.

“It’s very unnatural [holding up your phone]. It makes them look like a total doofus if they’re doing it for an extended period of time,” Keslin explained. “In ‘Pokemon Go,’ the only time they really use it is to share their encounter with the Pokémon. To take that one picture, which is natural….Everybody takes a picture, and then they’re done. It’s not walking around the world with the phone in front of their face.”

The executive also mentioned that “audio is different” and that it’s something that can be unobtrusive and hidden. The mention of audio for an AR experience was intriguing, which is why TechCrunch followed up with the Niantic executive about that.

Keslin revealed that audio was something that Niantic has already experimented with back when it was developing “Ingress,” the company’s first major augmented reality mobile game. Some of these experimental features include providing users audio cues telling users which way to go and even receiving a phone call when they’ve reached a waypoint.

Another possible application of audio in the AR game was integrating audio with a smartphones’ accelerometer. This will let the game know what the user is currently doing with their phone.

“I think audio is significant. It’s one of our senses,” Keslin said. “It’s one of things that really drives us. I want to look at ways to incorporate audio in future titles. AR is not just visual.”

Keslin was asked on whether some of these unused audio features will become part of “Pokemon Go” in the future. “Maybe. Or maybe we’d use it in other games. We’re not a one-game wonder,” the executive said.

Keslin didn’t give out any more details on Niantic’s upcoming new game, but he did confirm that it was already under active development. When asked if the new AR game would be playable by next year, Keslin simply responded by saying “maybe.” That may be vague, but it's possible that the company’s fans could learn more about this new game in the coming weeks or months ahead, as pointed out by Engadget.

Integrating audio cues in “Pokemon Go” could really be a useful feature. Instead of walking around with their smartphones in front of their faces, players could simply wait for an audio cue to alert them of a nearby Pokemon, PokeStop or a Gym. The only problem with this is that it may render the Pokemon Go Plus accessory a bit useless.

What’s truly interesting is Niantic’s next AR game. The mobile game developer has only released two augmented reality games so far, the first being “Ingress” and the second being “Pokemon Go.” Both games heavily rely on the visual aspects of AR, but “Pokemon Go” seems to be the only one that got everyone’s attention.