Playing the newest Pokémon games might result in your Roku hardware being sent to a fritz. This has been confirmed by Roku, adding that the Pokémon Shield and Sword is causing the interference issues for some of the products of the company. Such a problem can be serious enough to crash the Roku hardware or drive Roku TVs into the so-called "boot loop." In connection to this, players are said to have started noticing the issues over the weekend, and online tech news site CNET reported the said issue. Fortunately, a fix was swiftly rolled out early this week.
A Roku spokesperson told The Verge through e-mail that they are "aware of an issue when using the latest Pokémon and Nintendo Switch, affecting a limited number of Roku hardware." He added, the company is rolling out an update to the software to resolve it, and affected users can check for the said update by going to "Settings," then locate the "System" option, and then, the "Software Update."
Affected Devices
In an article it posted on its website, The Verge said affected devices included "select Roku streaming sticks and Roku TVs from brands like Insignia, for one." Moreover, a nearby Switch which runs the games is all that's essential for some Roku owners "to run into trouble" even though the console is not in their actual apartment or home.
Meanwhile, Roku has published instructions for their fixed firmware update. Say, your product is presently stuck in a boot loop, Roku recommends that you turn off your Switch or put it in an airplane mode. Then, power your Roku device on to get back up and running. After backing up, install the update. The leading philosophy for the reason this problem took place is Pokemon Shield and Sword's constant search for nearby Switch players and consoles.
Causing the Hardware to Crash
Pokemon is sending a network discovery pocket to every device plugged on port 26037. More so, Roku listens, too, on that particular port for LAN-based updates in order for the multiple devices running on the same network to update each other. This was a clear or noticeable decision. Such a network discovery saved Roku "about a quarter-million dollars in costs of CDN traffic." Roku is famous in the commercial area, where it is frequently used as a source of media to control hundreds of TVs running on the same network.
Causing the hardware to crash seems to be a random issue a video game could have. It just so happens to be associated with the Pokemon Sword and Shield, which has drawn enormous controversy for many reasons. One of these reasons is the decision of game developer Game Freak not to allow all Pokemon games to be imported into different and new titles.
