Ingress AMA Archive

Q1: The Ingress.com re-launch had several codes embedded within. One of them resolved to “ingress prime releases nov 18”, which would have been the day after the November Recursion Prime anomalies. Ingress Prime obviously released on Nov 5. Was the timing of the launch as expected?

Q2: Are you, personally, satisfied with the execution of this week’s Ingress Prime launch and the way in which it was communicated to the player base?

Q3: Does Niantic have plans to offer some manner of faction validation to communities, and if so, what is it? (This could be as simple as putting a “THIS IS ME” icon on your own profile and leaving it off when looking at others’ profiles in the scanner, or as complex as an API for validating your IGN to the Auth via Google/Facebook/other Authentication sources.)

Q4: Reviewing a “brief” outline of the Ingress Prime Beta release program announcements, promises, and actions (listed below), can you please forward to the folks in charge of Player Communication how frustrating it is to have such scattershot and inconsistent communication? A great summary of the “complaint”: https://plus.google....

Q5: About hashtags. Divide into #Ingress and #IngressPrime, and mixed use with both hashtags(it means… #Ingress posts and other #IngressPrime posts each exist same time)are not good at search with hastags, or characters limitation on Twitter(Japanese limitation is 140characters). So, should we use #Ingress on SNS like Twitter and Instagram and etc. ?

Q6: Could you pass the suggestion to bring the nearest portals quick view back in Ingress Prime? It's a very useful feature when visiting new places.

Q7: What are your plans for the weekend?

Q8: Where are the local scores and leaderboards?

Q9: With the Pokémon Go POI Submissions Beta being rolled out, is there any new information you can tell us about making OPR more accessible for Ingress Players or giving OPR access Pokémon Go players?

Q10: Will Niantic consider a more legible overlay for Prime? I am having difficulty reading the screen at tiny fonts on my iPhone SE.

Q11: What does it take to get Niantic to actually consult the community regarding potentially controversial game-changing actions, e.g. introducing pay-to-win microtransactions in the form of in-game items?

Q12: What do you think about a Mission Day National Parks style?

Q13: Are there any plans to translate the voice in the scanner to other lenguages with Ingress Prime?

Q14: Can you ask the OPR folks for their thoughts on bike share stations? Seems to me like they’d be a great “get out and explore” type of portal.

Q15: Until when will it be possible to use the recurse Option?

Q16: Are there any News about the Year six badge and double AP Time?

Q17: I have to disable my VPN with Prime. Just me, intentional or a bug?

Q18: Who did you vote for?

Q19: Can Prime and Scanner [REDACTED] be open at the same time on the same device with the same account?

Q20: Will Ingress [Redacted] be updated to show the prestige levels of multiple Onyx tiers?

Q21: I want to know new Investigation reports ASAP. so how to track new Investigation Board? do you have any options?

Q22: Why that passcode button below all that store items and bad way to input in the text box .. why not make easy like a button like store and give access to easily redeem them ??

Q23: The icon for agents who have recursed looks suspiciously like the logo for the Washington Capitals. The simulacrum badge looks an awful lot like the DC United logo. Will we be seeing more iconography from DC sports teams on the year 6 badge? Perhaps a curly W?

Q24: In future Ingress anomalies, can players count on dedicated NIA Gamemaster support (i.e. not player volunteers, who are usually attending and playing these events on the ground) for quick response to serious gameplay issues such as spoofing?

Q25: Recipe for your spaghetti.

Q26: would tornado sirens count as a unique form of architecture that is prominent(sort of like water towers or windmills) in areas that have the need for them as an early warning system? They’re also normally

Q27: Where is the best place to suggest improvements?

Q28: Recently PokemonGo launched a new feature that count the distance you travel even when the app is closed and synchronize that distance to the game. That would be an amazing feature to help with the Trekker badge. Is it possible that we could have it "Soon" with Prime?

Q29: could we get clarification on what makes art galleries viable candidates?

Q30: Every AMA lately has included at least one question about difficulties with the mission approval process, and every AMA has included an answer that says "read the mission submission guidelines." We'd love to read the mission approval guidelines that Niantic staff are following, because they don't seem to be the same ones that mission creators have been given to read... I realize that NIA staff don't have the time to write detailed rejection letters for each mission, and that it's apparently undesirable to create rejection form letters that list one reason instead of a whole laundry list, but a detailed review of a handful of rejected missions would help the community as a whole understand how to create better missions and possible even reduce the current cycle of "resubmit repeatedly with minor changes until it is accepted."

Q31: in the sports field clarification from last AMA, there was quite a bit of chaos concerning whether it was intended that a sports field without a sign could or should be given less than 5 stars. Many thought that it was could rather than should because most sports fields can be easily verified by google maps or photospheres; and the requirement of a sign disqualifies anywhere between 50-80% of sports fields in any given town often depending upon the affluence of a town. That would in effect punish rural communities most of all being that they tend to be the least affluent. A little more clarification there may be necessary. Could suggests that Niantic is aware of the reality that there is a problem with rogue reviewers/reviewers not up to date with the guidelines, while should seems to run contrary to the spirit of the game and the current mode suggesting that Niantic desires more POI rather than fewer; as well as aiding the rural communities in gaining more POI.

Q32: Will Niantic be issuing refunds for OPR live for the next anomaly, since submitting new portals, edits, etc., is a function not available on Ingress Prime?

Q33: If you had a choice between Italian and Japanese food what would you pick?

Q34: will we see more ADA friendly graphics?

Q35: Can I have a couch portal already?

Q36: Quick fire prime questions! What's your favorite feature? What feature do you miss the most? What feature are you looking forward to? What prime feature do you dislike the most.

Q37: Hey there, any idea when the "cannot find account" issue will be fixed, or if you know what the problem is? Really can't wait to play Prime but can't because of this issue.

Q38: What benefits will we see for participating in recursion?

Q39: If you are an anomaly-planner, how would you handle an anomaly-goer hitted the recurse button because he want that onxy yearly badge?

Q40: On the previous version of the scanner the faction changes where only available by a request outside the app and could only be done once. With the Recursion button, agents have the opportunity to change faction, when reaching level 16. If a Player requested a FC before, with the Recursion the posibilty is open again, or the FC is still once in a lifetime thing even for recursing agents? Also, is there a limit to how many times an agent could recurse?

Q41: Was the launch of Prime moved up so you wouldn't have to answer (as many) OPR questions during your monthly AMA? Unrelated: C25K progress? I'm doing terrible.

Q42: Would Niantic consider open-source Ingress 1.0 once you fully migrate to Prime?

Q43: What is up with getting the following message in prime, "Ingress is not supported on this device configuration". I have the Google Pixel 3 so how is it not compatible?

Q44: Will the second ocf participation be counted in the ocf badge? Give the situation that there is still no counting in the current ocf, stealth, prime challenge, and intel ops badges.

Q45: did you/Niantic noticed our petition about the in-game store gear selling issue?

Q46: Are there any plans to display the status of portal submissions? what ratings they’re receiving, how many reviews they’ve received, and a way to see/report/track a submission that appears to have gone into limbo(where you do not get the submission back after logging out and back/uninstalling & reinstalling) and never receive a confirmation email?

Q47: Will there ever be content in Prime that takes advantage of Android's AR Core and iOS's AR Kit?

Q48: Will there be improvements to what I can do as a player for making the game more my own? Rearranging my own badges seems rather innocuous, has it been considered as a feature?

Q49: What do you think about propelling the electric vehicle movement by approving car charging stations as portals in Ingress?

Q50: How is Niantic addressing portals and then fields made from restricted access portals? Many agents have quit and slowed down play, especially newer ones because of these large fields that can't be dropped, and needing to wait for the faction who put them up, to take them down. Do you consider such portals within the spirit of the game?

Q51: [REDACTED]

Q52: What is the over/under for Rhetorical questions for this months AMA ?

Q53: Pretty much all ingress players are unpaid volunteers to help you earn money. (Submitting portals, OPR, etc) Why do you need to monetize this game and earn money on top of your free labor?

Q54: Next AMA will be hosted on Reddit?

Q55: Why did you release Prime beta as an "update" of the actually ingress classic less than 2 weeks before a round of anomaly?

Q56: Hi, Andrew, have you watched anime yet? The reputation in Japan that has already been released seems to be quite good. There are many people 's impressions that they want to see continuation. Please give me comments that will make me expect.

Q57: Regarding anomalies, will the announcement of cities for future events such as anomalies be done in advance like what they did before for the prime series?

Q58: Will there be a challenge like the Cassandra neutralizer in the future?

Q59: For the upcoming anomaly weekend, do we need to use Ingress prime or can we use the scanner redacted version?

Q60: Will there be a better OPR system?

Q61: Is it possible for satellite cities for anomalies to have the option to buy official shirts by niantic?

Q62: Will there be a physical card for those who purchased the digital readiness bundle?

Q63: When will the PAC's daily investigate and Jojo's Word of the day come back? Will Verum Inveniri send us any intels during the next anomaly?

Q64: When can we expect to be able to start recruiting new agents through the scanner again?

Q65: What things would you do different if this was all over again?

Q66: Serious question: What options for portal appeals are being considered for when Google+ shuts down?

Q67: Silly question: Elvis or Beatles?

Q68: What notable things have you seen individuals and communities do to strengthen cross-faction relationships in an area?

Q69: What are some things to expect with improvements to Ingress Prime within the following month?

Q70: How much will Niantic look at input from the new subreddit?

Q71: Would you consider useful an option to toggle the streets white? For daylight playing and LCD screens it would be great to see the map when it is not "scanning" or doing the "wave/radar thing" without having to crank the brightness to 155%. Optional and with toggle button, for everyone's happiness.

Q72: Hi Andrew. I have a story to tell about the lifetime AP in the profile. Some of agents like me have changed their faction or cleaned their AP before this “Recursion” functionality appears(let’s call it from generation 1 to generation 2). And for these guys when they click the recurse button(for a 3nd generation ), they can easily find out that the AP they gained in generation 1 don’t count in the lifetime AP. I think this doesn’t match the common sense as the lifetime AP it shows don’t match the effort of an agent’s lifetime. How do you think about this and is there anything can be done for this?

Q73: Do lower player than 16 could recurse?

Q74: Will you recurse? Are there plans for bacon beacons?

Q75: Was it a conscious decision to launch Prime before it was as fully-featured as the original client, or was this the result of a poorly-run beta testing phase?

Q76: Starting in October, NIA OPS stopped accepting missions with icons, the image of which I painted personally and only for missions in Ingress. The argument is very simple - the picture is not yours and we do not accept such missions. What needs to be done to convincingly show that it was me who drew the image for mission icons?

Q77: Are you expecting any changes to the rules for the next round of anomalies? Any time line for the rules and playboxes being released?

Q78: Given that the #1 complaint about the Ingress client over the last five years has been high data usage and excessive battery drain, what was the rationale behind exacerbating this problem by adding portal photos into COMMs for every single action, and greenlighting a new interface that uses so much more battery unnecessarily?

Q79: Serious question: is it possible that Archetypes are going to make an appearance in the Scanner for Agents to tinker with?

Q80: Silly question: when is the MuMu medal coming out?

Q81: Several attempts have been made to privatize the portal by entering Real name or IGN and modification of the portal. The same applies from PokemonGo. I got many reports from agents. We believe that incorrect information is causing serious flaws in the portal network. And there is also a new way of cyberbullying that destroys reputation by putting the real name of the agent who hate. Has there been a discussion about by renaming like this? Are there any countermeasures?

Q82: Is attacking in Ingress Prime broken, or is it the new normal?

Q83: I would appreciate a clarification for decorative objects placed to mark a driveway entrance to a private residence (decorated posts, rocks, other objects). They're clearly in front of private residences, but unclear whether they're in the road allowance or not. They're definitely placed and maintained by the property owner. Presuming they are unique enough to meet other portal criteria, should they be treated as private residential property?

Q84: Since NIA's selling gear now for pay to play, can we pay for real answers in the AMA now too? We still have tons of questions that have never actually been answered, and with a cash grab this transparent, pay for answers seems like the next step.

Q85: Why has the new version of Prime been released with missing functionality?

Q86: When will NIA start selling anomaly badges and other profile badges in the store?

Q87: Will you be introducing any new and innovative ways to pay for preferencial portal submissions beyond the current OPR Live, and if so, do you know what the pricing models will be?

Q88: Will you reset and repair the counters for agents who lost their Sojourner, because the unannounced update to Prime prevented access to some scanners?

Q89: Hi Andrew, what is the stance on portals located inside no photography zones which are already live.

Q90: If you had full decision power, what would be the ONE feature you would introduce ? Make us dream a bit!

Q91: As Ingress 6th anniversary approaches, feedback on the underwhelming performance by NIA Ops have been plenty. From the inability / unwillingness to detect multiple accounts, inventory laundering, short distance location spoofing to slow in action to ban the blatant bots and spoofers. There have been many promises from NIA Ops to take fair play seriously and enforcing their own rules - the results simply do not meet the players' expectation. * referencing previous AMA, G+ posts from various communities, comments from players in the post of NIA Ops Governance and transparency are almost non-existent with NIA Ops. From cases of - auto-ticket closure (lack of governance) - inconsistent handling of tickets (from action taken to number of days to review tickets) - Survey form is is not even provided when the requester request for it once the ticket is closed. - It seems that there is no audit on the quality / detail of investigation carried out by NIA Ops. (e.g: Some tickets on blatant spoofers got close without tangible action) Are NIA Ops able to share on what are the changes they are implementing with ingress prime on fair play (e.g: more staff to police fair play) as well as the improvements in place in terms of governance and transparency.

Q92: Why does Ingress Prime need access to my contacts?

Q93: Can we expect frequent updates to Prime with bug fixes or will it be a more 'periodic' rollout method?

Q94: What do you think about a Itemlimit 8000 instead of 2000

Q95: Why couldn't Prime have waited until the end of the Recursion Prime Anomaly series, such that it lines up with the current state of game play?

Q96: What is the current minimum hardware support for Prime?

Q97: My question to you. Will you ever, or think about visiting the Oregon Coast?

Q98: are there some restrictions on who can edit a portal location or can even a level 1 player submit such an edit? Shouldn’t Niantic remove this right to lower levels?

Q99: I want to invite my friend to Ingress Prime. Does Ingress Prime have plans to support Recruiter?

Q100: Can we finally know which city in Japan will have anomaly in March A: Things are taking a little longer than anticipated to confirm the new city and venue. I don’t have a specific day that an announcement will be soon and be several months ahead of the actual event allowing proper time to plan and organize.

Q101: Tea or Coffee?

Q102: Reddit or GDocs Calc sheets? What would you prefer to track bugs and issues?

Q103: Did Niantic kill of agent stats and other stats trackers on purpose or by accident?

Q104: Will we get an Ingress Community Manager in Europe? https://twitter.com/...

Q105: Andrew Krug will there be WearOS support put into Prime?

Q106: Hey Andrew why does prime calculate distances differently than scanner redacted?

Q107: Will niantic be placing limits on purchased gear?

Q108: Happy Diwali from all the Indians Andrew!.. How long is the redacted scanner expected to be available in the play store? 6 months?

Q109: Are you aware of the fact that if a new agent chancel the ingress prime tutorial in the setting he is instant a RES agent without any chance to choose the faction.

Q110: On the opening screen for Prime it shows the Global score but unless there’s a global event on few people really care about global score. It would be more interesting to be given the option to see your current cell score as that is more relevant to most players as it’s something they can affect and gives them local bragging rights

Q111: Why is the settings text and much of the other prime ingame text blue?

Q112: What sort of time frame would you personally find ideal for portal submissions to make it through OPR? A week? A month, maybe 6 months?

Q113: Why are we able to link our Facebook accounts, but not unlink our Google accounts? ETA for when this will be changed?

Q114: Will there be a "Double Agent" badge for agents who recursed twice in both factions?

Q115: Indoor portals generally get rejected, but it was stated here in AMA, that they are legit. Could the FAQ in OPR be updated?

Q116: Since G+ retiring, where will you be doing AMA's?

Q117: Can we please have an option to report portal pictures?

Q118: Ingress prime Linking is very slow. It will improve or not?

Q119: Players in my region submit new portals that would get rejected for being "too close to an existing portal" in wrong locations, get them approved by OPR in the wrong location, and then move the portal to the correct location with a position edit (which apparently does not respect the "too close" criteria). What should I do about this? Report the portal and players in question? Or use the same approach whenever I get a "too close" answer for my portal submissions?

Q120: COMPLEX hacking in Ingress Prime is much faster than in the old version of Ingress, is this intended or a bug? Right now doing a 5 glyphs COMPLEX seems almost impossible

Q121: Comments are still open? Sweet. How many messages did you get after Prime was launched? Did your Phone make it?

Q122: Will the REDACTED scanner be arroud permanently, so that we dont have to get frustrated with PRIME every time we want to play Ingress?

Q123: A small question PAC told us to ask: What happened at the Niantic Project?

Q124: Hi Andrew, I just now had a look at prime, and found out the language switch in the settings is gone? Is that permanent, or just a feature being added back later?

Q125: Will in app passcode input become available for iphone?

Q126: Will there be an option to minimize or disable the fancy animations to improve the Performance of the game?

Q127: Any plans to improve the procedure for reporting invalid portals? On my wishlist is the ability to include photo and video evidence with the initial report so that fewer reports need to go through the cumbersome appeals process.

Q128: To estimate the impact on the next anomalies can you provide a number how many item packs with L7/8 items and VR/Aegis Shields has been sold?

Q129: Will recursed agents who keep their old faction lose their owned portals? If no, will their 'Max Time Portal Owned' counter still tick up?

Q130: Will niantic review the portal submission screen within the scanner to limit the location picker to a small radius around the actual location? At the moment it is dead easy just pick a location anywhere in the world. And to no surprise this is abused by some.

Q131: How come Ingress players have to wait 2 years for a new version, with LESS features than Ingress 1.0 while PoGo players gets features and events all the time?

Q132: Good morning, with the Recursion agents who failed twice in the OPR Recon test, will they have the opportunity to take the test again?

Q133: who invented the new prime layout ? ( I would like to have a personal tet a tet with this fella ;-) )

Q134: Is there anything the community manager is allowed to elaborate on the subject of the massively decreased portal picture review rate in order to stop further conspiracy theories?

Q135: Are you attending the Los Angeles anomaly, or mayhaps one of the two Asuncion ones?

Q136: Don't have a question for your AMA this month but wanted to say thank you for all of your hard work and dedication to the Ingress Community.

Q137: Also are ornaments likely to be supported in prime by anomaly weekend or should anomaly goers use the redacted client?

Q138: Does the NIA or Niantic have any policy or advice of how to best interact with visitors from other dimensions like the Osiris Dimension? Should we avoid telling them the history of their 1218-counterparts? Do you consider it wise to keep 1218-POI from ever directly interacting with their Prime Counterparts?

Q139: Could you comment on what the OPR rating stars actually mean? Our local chats have been debating this round and round again. Some say that 5* is full accept, 3* is unsure, 1* is reject, so therefore 2* is a rejection but not terrible, 4* is accepting but not 100% behind it. Others argue that 2* and up are acceptances, since 1* is the only reject.

Q140: Since Prime is out now, is there any point in keeping Prime Beta? Will it be used to test newer features?