During an interview at TechCrunch Distrupt, stated that battling in one-on-one matches is something the company is considering, and is one of the most requested features, but it doesn’t yet have a planned launch.
“It’s something that will probably make its way onto our road map,” Hanke said, stopping short of revealing whether or not it’s a feature actively in development.
Hanke also clarified that Niantic’s relationship with Apple and the Apple Watch is “not exclusive,” and the company wants to continue to get the game, and Niantic’s augmented reality platform, into as many hands as possible.
“Our whole mission as a company is to evangelize this whole concept of playing games outside — real world games,” Hanke said. “We want lots of people to create games like that. Our technology is a platform that can be used to make these experiences, so we’re interested in moving that genre of games forward.”
This doesn’t come as a huge surprise, as data miners have already found several references to Android Wear in the latest version of Pokémon Go‘s code.
Pokémon Go has already seen several significant changes since its launch in July. The “Buddy Pokémon” feature now lets you pick your favorite companion (and not just Pikachu!) to follow you on foot as you explore the great outdoors, and Apple Watch support allows players to track Pokémon without taking their phones out of their pockets. If actually want to catch them, however, you will still need to do so.
