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Pokemon Go Dev Takes Away Players' Legendaries, Citing "Fairness"

Pokemon Go dev Niantic has revoked any legendaries players may have caught.

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Earlier this week, one Pokemon Go player claimed that they caught Legendary Pokemon Articuno. Other players called them cheaters, though in one fell swoop, developer Niantic confirmed that Legendary Pokemon accidentally got into the game and that it revoked them from any players who caught one.

Niantic provided GameSpot with a statement on the situation, admitting that some Legendary Pokemon may have found their way into players' games, though this was unintentional and has been "rectified."

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Now Playing: GS News Update: Pokemon Go Dev Takes Away Players' Legendaries, Citing "Fairness"

"We recently noticed that a few Legendary Pokemon got into a few accounts when they shouldn't have," Niantic said. "To preserve the game's integrity and as a measure of fairness, we have rectified the situation and revoked the legendary Pokemon from the Trainers' accounts."

We've contacted Niantic and the Articuno's former owner to find out if any kind of compensation was offered. We'll update this article as we receive more information.

This follows a bunch of changes to Pokemon Go that have players upset with the game's developer. A recent update removed a broken tracking feature, instead of fixing it. This caused an outrage in the community, to which Niantic responded and said it was taken out "in order to improve the underlying design."

"The original feature, although enjoyed by many, was also confusing and did not meet our underlying product goals," it said. "We will keep you posted as we strive to improve this feature."

On top of that, third-party sites such as PokeVision, which helped players find Pokemon, were taken down, and some players have reported that it's now more difficult to catch Pokemon, even at lower levels. Some, including GameSpot's Alexa Ray Corriea, believe the game is now broken without tracking. and you can read her article here.

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