Lured Up Podcast 387 - Clutch Your Pearls

Live Streamed on - 3/17/2026

Publish Date - 3/19/2026

We switched up the show format this week as the community news was too good to hold off on discussing. Social media was on fire thanks to a hit piece style tweet from a non-credible source was viewed over 20 million times. It shared the horrors of Niantic building a network to train automated pizza delivery robots using data collected through Pokémon GO. The pearl clutching and fauxrage was rampant with so many feigned gasps of air coming mainly from X.

We look at the actual article that sparked interest in Niantic Spatial’s dealings from the MIT Technology Review. We discuss how Niantic’s vision for a complete 1:1 digital to IRL map of the world has always been the goal. Could we have known that pizza delivery robots would be amongst the fist to benefit from the map? Of course not but it is amazing to see Niantic’s vision start to be realized.

The VPS is an amazing tool and LLM that Pokémon GO, Ingress, and Wayfarer have always been a part of. Wayfinders and keepers of the Gameboard have been enthusiastic about being a part of this process. Anyone saying they had no idea that this GPS based game is tracking our GPS data is simply feigned ignorance. 

We run through some wishlist ideas that we have for the game, where the gameboard and environment is the focus. From persistent AR instances to the introduction of HMs allowing you to traverse different terrains, the gameboard truly is paramount to our experience. The question is, with Niantic Spacial separating from the Niantic brand which was acquired by Scopely, will we ever see the technology behind the VPS be utilized in PGO going forward.

Finally we recap the last week of gameplay including the Pokopia Event and Scorbunny Community Day. We have some new Event announcements and nao everything out on our Google Calendar. 

Newsforce Hit Piece

MIT Technology Review

Dexerto Article

Niantic Spatial VPS

Pokopia Event

Scorbunny Community Day

Fashion Raid Day

April Community Day

Stay up to date by adding our Google Calendar to your account!

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Hosts

Ken Pescatore

Adam Tuttle

Writer and Producer

Ken Pescatore

Executive Producer 

Xander

Show music provided by GameChops and licensed through Creative Commons

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Intro Music

Lake Verity (Drum & Bass Remix) 

Tetracase

GameChops - Ultraball

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https://soundcloud.com/tetracase 

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Break Music

National Park

Mikel & GameChops

GameChops - Poké & Chill

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https://twitter.com/mikel_beats

Outro Music

Vast Poni Canyon

CG5 & GlitchxCity (Future Bass Remix)

GameChops - Ultraball

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http://soundcloud.com/cg5-beats

https://soundcloud.com/glitchxcity

Pokémon And All Respective Names are Trademark and © of Nintendo 1996-2025 Pokémon GO is Trademark and © of Niantic, Inc.Lured Up and the Pokémon Professor Network are not affiliated with Niantic Inc., The Pokémon Company, Game Freak or Nintendo.

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