While Apple held its event for the company’s new iOS products, Niantic Labs was a part of the entire event showing off a new Pokemon GO app for the Apple Watch called Pokemon GO Plus, named after the accessory the developers are still planning to release. Don’t get too sad we don’t have this app yet, because while it does do some nice things like notify you of nearby Pokemon, and what those Pokemon are, and more, you still need to pull out your phone to capture them.
Update: September 16th, 2016 11:42am PST: One last quick update to let everyone interested in grabbing one of these accessories know that the Pokemon GO Plus is now officially available for purchase. You can pick one up through Amazon or over at GameStop. Other retailers will probably follow shortly.
Update: September 8th, 2016 11:12am PST: Just a second quick update to let everyone know that the launch date for the Pokemon GO Plus accessory is officially September 16th, 2016, pending any further delays of course. You can check on those details over on the official post Niantic Labs has put out on the Pokemon GO blog.
Update: September 8th, 2016 9:22am PST: For those of you out there wanting to pick up one of these physical accessories for Pokemon GO, it appears that pre-orders for the wristband have gone live again, but so far only on the official UK Nintendo store. It hasn’t appeared yet on the North American Nintendo store, but it should. The UK store has it listed as a limited exclusive for right now. This also means that the official launch and shipping should be happening very soon. You can hit up the UK store here to snap up a pre-order for the Pokemon GO Plus accessory.
However, during Niantic Labs showcasing of the new app, the developers also confirmed that the delayed release of the actual physical accessory called the Pokemon GO Plus, which has its launched delayed from this Summer to September, will still actually be arriving this month.
This accessory will basically do the same thing that the new application does, except there is less information available. It really just notifies you if a Pokemon is nearby with a vibration and flashing light, but not actually what that Pokemon is, or any other information. Good news is, you still have to pull your phone out to capture Pokemon with this accessory as well.
As for whether or not the Pokemon GO App will be arriving for Android smartwatches, nothing like that was mentioned at the Apple event, but there’s a chance it will show up sometime after the iOS version’s release. We will post an update once we fine out.
