So they were trying to pump up the value by making the game obviously worse. Community Day tickets have increased in price with a changed format that makes them not worth it at all. Every single screen is trying to upsell you now.
Yea, the gym system in the beginning was terrible and encouraged many of the weirdos that play the game to become outright bullies with lots of reported physical confrontations. Even without them , there was absolutely nothing fun about fighting a bunch of Chanseys. Raids are also one of the best features in the game. There have been many improvements, but they've also added crap.
I played a lot of Pokemon growing up, and I even played Ingress (the precursor to Pokemon Go) before Pokemon Go came around. I was excited to see a pervasive-type game getting popular and was excited to join the fun, but I tried playing for a week in the first couple of months and found it excruciatingly boring and unengaging. Swipe-tap battling felt so incredibly braindead and uninspired. No type match ups? No move selection? Just play a numbers game with all the gym leaders and swipe swipe swipe tap tap tap? Pass.
The only exciting part about the whole experience was going out to my college campus to catch something at a landmark in the evening and encountering a small group of other players.
