'Pokemon GO' Update Leaves Rooted, Jailbroken Phones Banned; Players Demand Immediate Refund

Niantic warned users ahead of "Pokémon Go's" latest update that the game would never again be supporting those with jailbroken or rooted phones. That didn't stop eager players to choose a Buddy Pokémon from crying out after updating yesterday, just to find that Pokémon Go has ceased to support their devices.

Niantic now banning rooted phones

"This device, OS, or software is not compatible with Pokémon GO," reads the message that now greets a significant number of mentors, who also happen to have jailbroken smartphones. Unless they revert back to the version of the game before the 0.37.0 update, Pokémon fans have no way to advance past this screen.

Victims of this update are retaliating with their wallets, according to Reddit. One user of a highly upvoted thread details his experience going through Google customer service in order to to get a refund for his "Pokémon GO" in-app purchases.

People's take on Niantic's new policy

"I wouldn't have had a problem if they blocked rooted users from launch," original poster GnothiSeauton said of Niantic. "However, doing it 2 months into the show after rooted users have invested time and money into the game, is completely unscrupulous."

This form of protest has a slim success rate as is, bit it's only applicable to people who spent money on the free-to-play game. For everyone else, there doesn't seem to be much hope. Banning changed smartphones from "Pokémon GO" falls along the lines of Niantic's measures to increase security and diminish cheating. Be that as it may, many posters on Reddit have mentioned that people commonly root their phones for other reasons.

Can this hinder Pokemon GO's resurgence?

With Pokémon Go facing a possible revival - Buddy System is an exciting new feature, and the Pokémon Go Plus peripheral is already in high demands before its release on Friday - the timing of the user ban could dampen the game's re-entry back into the cultural conversation.

For anyone not negatively affected by the update, check out what's new and what's coming to the game this week.