Pokemon Go, the wildly popular mobile game, is not yet available in The Pokemon Company’s home country of Japan. According to John Hanke, the CEO of developer Niantic Labs, the free-to-play title should launch in Japan by the end of July. The reason it’s not out yet in the island nation, he told Forbes, is due to server capacity issues.
“At present, the server capacity in Japan is not powerful enough,” he said. “We are working hard with our partners in Japan to enable the servers to keep up with demand once the game goes online there. We expect it to be released by the end of July.”
However, “game watchers and those familiar with Japan’s network complexities” told Forbes that a mid-September release sounds more likely. We’ve followed up with Niantic Labs in an attempt to get more details on Pokemon Go’s Japanese release.
Whatever the case, Hanke has said he hopes to launch Pokemon Go in more than 200 markets relatively soon. The game is already available in major regions such as the US, UK, and Australia. It’s taken the world by storm, basically, and is no doubt going to be even bigger when it comes to Japan.
In other Pokemon Go news, a Florida man fired a gun at Pokemon Go players, reportedly believing them to be thieves.
For more on Pokemon Go, check out GameSpot’s review.