Gabe Newell thinks Pokemon Go should have a bigger impact on mobile gaming

Almost six years after its debut, Pokémon Go remains one of the most popular mobile games in the world. But the promised AR revolution has yet to materialize, and Valve co-founder Gabe Newell is one of those disappointed.

Speaking to Rock Paper Shotgun on the occasion of the Steam Deck launch, Newell said he thinks Pokémon Go should have “more impact” for mobile gaming. Instead, follow-ups like Harry Potter Wizard’s Unite have largely disappeared.

Instead, Newell hopes that Valve will continue to launch Steam Deck by creating more mobile experiences that make sense for the platform.

“I think Pokemon Go should have had more of an impact on people considering the space for opportunity than mobile games could, and it really didn’t.” Neval said. “I think that’s one of the things that really excites us, you know, we built this building block, this very critical set of components, to make that happen. And now we can do some really cool stuff. Switch to R&D mode.”

Valve has a history of making games that take advantage of hardware innovations. Half-Life: Alyx is a recent example, as it was clearly made with Valve’s VR hardware in mind.

Newell says he’s looking forward to exploring new possibilities. “[I]It’s also very exciting to say that we’re going to prototype, three or four different new ideas for what you can fit into a mobile gaming platform that expands the experience. Go to the software developers and ask them to say “Trash” or “Oh, that’s great”. Or “OMG, you should be doing this” and “Let’s work together on a software prototype that matches your hardware prototype to really test these features.” It’s quite exciting to explore it fully, it’s not only a point where you can do it, but also when you start to unlock what you can do in these environments. So yeah, we’re pretty excited. We want to keep trying to be really innovative.

We’ve recently come to grips with the Steam Deck, which we refer to as a “well-built piece of hardware” that doesn’t offer a particularly smooth user experience. We also spoke to Newell about the launch and future of the platform, where he confirmed that Valve has no plans to increase the price of any of the three original hardware configurations.

As for Pokémon Go, it still works after all these years. There are a lot of Pokemon announcements planned this weekend to celebrate Pokemon Day 2022. Expect more Pokemon Go news on February 26.