'Pokemon Go' new Party Play feature adds another reason to team up in real life

Niantic has always been big on bringing players together when it comes to their games. It's a key pillar in the design of "Pokemon Go" and "Monster Hunter Now." Players gather around events such as Raid Hour or hunt boosted spawns of a rare pink Rathian. They make friends face to face while accomplishing the goal of defeating a legendary Pokemon or carving parts from a rare creature.

Now, the developer hopes to amplify that feeling togetherness through Party Play in "Pokemon Go." The new feature, which comes out soon, lets players team up in groups of up to four and challenge each other to catch Pokemon, spin stops or do activities such as defeating raids. The new feature is available in the Trainer Profile under a new Party Tab. Once you create a party, it creates a numerical code or QR code so that nearby friends can scan or enter the numbers.

Doing that puts your friends in your game and you're all represented on the screen walking around together. The max party is four and the minimum is two with the leader being able to add new friends that players could meet along the way.

So what's the point of Party Play? It allows for friendly competition with rewards. As a Party Play participant, if you reach goals such as catching 120 Pokemon, you can earn Ultra Balls or Mega Beedrill energy. It all depends on what the leader chooses for a challenge.

Bigger than that though, Party Play also offers a new ability in raids called Party Power. It essentially double the damage of your next Charged Attack and it charges with every Fast Attack, according to a Niantic news release. That means more party members means that the Party Power charges faster. It could be a way for players to beat a raid if they're short on trainers. In a nice touch, being party of party means that players will automatically get a raid invite.

Party Play could come in handy when challenging Greavard, which is coming to 3-star raids for Halloween. It will definitely be needed for Shadow Lugia Raids that come out around the same time.

As for the nitty gritty of Part Play, players need to be the same distance from a Pokestop spin to get raids and other features to work. You can't send over your party code to a friend overseas and expect them to teleport beside you. Normally, Party Play lasts one hour and then it's over. That could work for Raid Hours, but Niantic is considering expanding that time limit for special events.

Unfortunately, you can't track all your Party Play stats forever. They disappear when the session ends, but you can take photos of who caught the most Pokemon or defeated the most raids, and you can share to social media for longevity. The Activity Summary track five different categories: Pokemon, Throws, Adventure, Battle and General.

Lastly, Party Play is available to trainers level 15 and above. To mark the release of Party Play, Niantic is offering free Evee shirts for player avatars.

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