Pokémon Go Valentine's event fails to match Halloween boost

Mobile analytics firm Apptopia has released new stats on Pokémon Go which show the recent Valentine's Day event was not as successful as Niantic might have hoped.

The event ran from February 7th to 15th and increased the chances of pink Pokémon appearing as well as doubling the amount of candy players collect with each action and extending lure effect time to six hours - all in the name of trying to entice more players back to the game and stave off the decline that has beset the game since its peak in late July.

Apptopia reports that players spent $5.75m on the game across the nine-day period, a 16% rise when compared to the previous nine days. Interestingly, Valentine's Day itself proved to be the least lucrative day of the promotion.

These revenues are respectable enough but the site also reports that they amount to less than half the money generated by Pokémon Go's first promotional event around Halloween. Niantic only ran this for seven days, doubling the candy earned and increasing the appearances of 'scary' Pokémon.

Despite being two days shorter, the Halloween event brought in $13.35m - a 47% increase over the previous week.

Apptopia's brand ambassador Adam Blacker suggested several reasons for the disparity between the two promotions, including the game's ongoing overall decline, and the colder weather outside. He also noted that the novelty of a promotion will have worn off following the Halloween, Christmas and New Year's events.

Finally, he added: "People who had dates or significant others were probably nudged to put the phone away for Valentine's Day."

The news emerges in the same week that Niantic has begun rolling out the second generation of monsters as well as a handful of new features in further efforts to recapture some of the excitement the game saw when it launched last summer.