Back in early July, Pokemon GO became a global phenomenon in just a few days after its initial and rather limited launch. Since then, Niantic Labs’ augmented reality (AR) mobile game broke all sorts of records, achieved over 500 million downloads, earned well over half a billion dollars, caused a stampede or two and was the talk of the town for months. Almost four months later, Pokemon GO isn’t as popular as it was over the summer but it’s still one of the most played games on the planet.
While a vocal portion of veteran players are occasionally complaining online about a lack of new features, it’s obvious that a lot of people are still enjoying catching pocket monsters out in the wild. If looking at numerous reports on top grossing apps isn’t enough to prove that claim, perhaps the fact that Pokemon GO Plus is currently sold out in most parts of the world is. Despite being a rather niche accessory priced at $34.99, the demand for Pokemon GO Plus is currently so high that Nintendo actually dedicated a significant portion of its latest financial briefing to address it and even apologized to consumers and distributors for not anticipating it.
Now, this is all in spite of the fact that this wearable accessory was two months late to the market. Imagine if it arrived in July as it was originally planned, when more people were catching Pokemon on a daily basis than using the likes of Snapchat and Twitter. In other words, it seems that Nintendo dropped the ball on this one and its president Tatsumi Kimishima said as much while he was speaking at the company’s semi-annual financial results briefing earlier this week. Given the fact that Nintendo only pulls in about 20% of Pokemon GO in-game revenue, it potentially missed out on a big chance to additionally cash in on Niantic Labs’ game while its popularity was at its peak. The Japanese entertainment company is now hoping it can still recover some lost sales in the coming weeks as Kimishima stated it’s currently in the process of expanding production. No specifics have yet been given but note that if you’re still looking to buy Pokemon GO Plus, you should get your chance shortly.