What Are You Loving About Pokémon Go?

PokemonGo

It’s a craze that’s sure to get you injured or arrested but people can’t get enough of Pokémon Go. Are you playing?

Just back from my family vacation in Los Angeles and the whole world is

StarTrekTNGTheGame

While walking back to our hotel one night three young men raced past us across the street. My first inclination was that they’d stolen something but they were intently focused on their phones. One of them dropped a charging cord and as we followed behind to get it back to them we noticed they exchanged some words with a group of two others who were also looking at their phones. “Ah, they must be on a scavenger hunt,” I thought. Nope. They were all playing Pokémon Go.

Yes, has quickly taken over the areas of the world in which it’s available (and even some it’s not). While privacy issues have already arisen, Holocaust museums have had to tell players there are some places that aren’t appropriate to catch them all, dead bodies have been found, and criminals have used the app to lure unsuspecting victims right to them, the latest report has the app at a whopping 15 million downloads.

I somehow missed the original Pokémon craze growing up so this is one part of pop culture I’m actually pretty clueless on. But I immediately recognized what an amazing creation this app was for simply getting gamers out into the “real world” and interacting with others face to face. Not everyone wants that, of course, but it’s pretty unique nonetheless. Personally, I’m not even going to start, I’ve got enough issues with just Neko Atsume (and Neopets in days past).




Are you playing? Let me know what you’re loving about it so far!

6 Responses to “What Are You Loving About Pokémon Go?”

  1. Mark Wyman says:

    STILL no love from Amazon for their Fire Phone in their app store for the Pokemon. Can’t catch ’em all unless big-daddy get’s his cut up front I guess.

  2. silaria says:

    I love the camaraderie. Like Adam said, I’ve had a lot of great experiences already gaming with strangers. But my favorite part had actually been exploring my neighborhood! I moved to this town about a year ago, and I know the main streets pretty well… but this week so far I’ve discovered several parks, a national cemetery, and a community center and pool complex. And I ran I to my local Burner contingent hanging out and dancing… with fire. It’s been awesome.

  3. lev36 says:

    I’ve resisted so far, but it does sound pretty cool.

  4. Glen Tickle says:

    Walking around with my three-year-old daughter is great. She gets pumped when she hears the pokemon appearing noise and loves throwing the balls. I’ve been playing it on my own too if I happen to be walking around somewhere, but I’m not really competitive or much of a collector so if Amelia wasn’t so into it I’d probably have lost interest by now.

    Also I just really fucking want to catch a Mr. Mime

  5. That Which Dreams says:

    You teach me,
    And I’ll teach you,
    PO-KE-MON!

  6. I haven’t felt like such a dork in AGES, but at Level 14 (45 seen, 44 caught), I’m obviously deep into it now, much to the vague irritation of my long suffering lady love. I love that it’s the original Pokemon from the games I bought with birthday money (I bought both blue and red and had nothing left over for a Gameboy, so I had to borrow one from a friend and gave up several weeks worth of lunches in trade) when I was, say, 12? Ish? I don’t want to look it up and know the horrifying truth…

    Regardless, catching a new Pokemon is always a stupid thrill, evolving them, finding new ways to increase experience points…all of it is great (though the game mechanics of battling and training are a bore and I hope they improve them). But the best bit came just yesterday: at lunch, I dropped a lure (the same gadget the robbers used, as a matter of fact) outside of a Pokestop and sat in my car listening to a podcast, eating lunch, and lazily catching Pokemon for twenty minutes. Alas, I had to go…and rounding the side of the building discovered a swarm of activity. My lure had summoned ten or twelve other people, who were all engaged and laughing and talking and sharing…and I had just been eating lunch! Sads. But now I know, at least? And then, yesterday evening, a similar thing happened: my wife wanted to go for a walk around our alma mater. There have been some landscaping improvements and we are constantly jealous of the infrastructure that’s grown up around what we lived through as a decaying, crumbling relic…and we were astonished by the level of Pokemon-related activity. Stops and gyms everywhere, and so many players! There were easily fourteen people wandering around the quad, heads in their phones. While some were paired, most were single. As we approached, one college age woman looked up sheepishly. “Are we all silently doing the exact same thing here?” I asked, loudly, looking around. She said, “I think so…” and laughed. And someone said, “It’s great!” And I said, “We’re all dorks together!” And…ah. It’s nice. It’s splendid. I’m so happy.

    Don’t get used to it.

    No, go ahead, do.