After revamping its tracking feature into pointing out nearby locations of possible interest and launching it in San Francisco, "Pokemon Go" is expanding the feature into more areas. Last week, it brought the new Nearby feature to many western territories in the US and Canada, as well as all of Australia. Now, the new feature is getting more access in America and Europe.
GameSpot reports that the new Nearby feature for "Pokemon Go" is now available in the entire continental United States (meaning no Hawaii). Developer Niantic Labs also mentions in their official site that the feature is also available in "large parts of Europe," but doesn't actually specify which parts of Europe it's available in already. It might be safe to assume that it's now available in the bigger countries, such as the UK, France, Germany, and the like.
What does the Nearby feature in "Pokemon Go" actually do? Instead of indicating which Pokemon are available in the nearby surroundings, it merely lets players know which areas some rare Pokemon may show up in. The Pokemon tracker feature in the game had been tweaked, removed, and eventually revamped into this feature, while third-party finder apps had also been banned, much to the frustration of players.
"Pokemon Go" has seen a rapid decline in its player base not very long after its initial launch due to these problems, and other fundamental issues players have with the game. While Niantic has mentioned on their official blog post that they are continuing to listen to all player feedback, it seems as though the changes players want are being applied incrementally. At this point, players are waiting for the Generation 1 Legendary Pokemon and Generation 2 onwards, but it's unsure whether these features will bring lost players back to the game.