Pokemon GO, rise and fall

When it was coming out, it seemed it could change the waywe play. But it had a short, even if intense, life.
We'll analyze what want wrong, and try to understand if this "new way" can still have a word in gaming world.

Pokemon GO is maybe one of the most revolutionary game in history. First, having the ability to combine a traditional console game with the "new way" is just a huge leap forward in a world where most people have a gaiming console in their pocket, being the smartphone a huge and versatile instrument, which changed the way we play a lot. But this is only one major change in our gaming routine. Pokemon GO needed you to walk and run to achieve objects, thus theorically making you healthier, since sedentary is one of the biggest problems in our society. And lastly, there was the normal, tremendous love we all have for Pokemons. No one can escape it. After all, who doesn't want a cute jirachi to pet every now and then?

Rise and first problems

In hindsight, the signals were there, if someone could interpret them.
When the game released (June 2016), firstly only in Austalia, US and New Zeland, the hype was so high that millions of mobile phones all over the world were applied workarounds, meant to make Google Play think they were in countries where the game was released. People simply couldn't wait a couple of days more. And so, as expected, 100 millions of downloads (about France and Spain population put together, to have a sample), was a number to be reckoned with by the game's servers, meant to held only a portion of that impossible number. This led to the first, yet simple problems. Servers collapsed, but they were soon made more powerful and the game came back online. 8-9 days later, the game was released in almost all over the world, so the number of players connected to a single server went down, making the outage and crashes less frequent and rising the hype again. The game was reaching its apex, being one of the most popular on Play store. In its realease week, the game was the most popular in all the store, and its active players were more than Candy Crush Saga ones. It was definitely a success.



A SOCIETY-CHANGING GAME

Most of the hype of Pokemon GO was from the "Go out and gotta catch em all" feeling; people got out a lot to walk, hatch eggs and grind into the game. the game created crowds in strange places and some traffic problems. Crowds in the middle of nowhere were normal. Some VIPs even complained about having even 50-70 people at their doorbell, looking for a snorlax, or other rare pokemons. People telling each other where some mons could be found led to strange moving crowds, something never seen before. The advent of tracking apps and websites made this only worse.
But the game created an even strenger phenomena. I remember watching TV and the news said that in most cities a new way of sightseeing was practiced: slow veichles to have walk speed (thus making eggs hatch) and breaks at Pokestops. Thinking about it later, this was one of the first signal of Pokemon GO's fall. The grind needed to grow in the game clashed with the amount of time people could spend on it.
The opposite side of this grind was the "homemade" side of this phenomena. Some people, in order to make the game think they were walking, took the car and begun driving at very slow speed (once i was out jogging, and passed a car driven by a man that wasn't watching the street, he was watching his phone. Even services like "one drives, one plays" were common (wich already was a safer way to do this, since the driver ws paying attention to the street. Anyway, this behavour caused (fortunately only for a week or two) small traffic problems; but they were nothing in confront of pokemon go-related crashes. Some people even died in accidents like this, but fortunately this phenomena died soon. People had other ways to achieve their goals, this time, digital ones.

The tricks that killed the game

As every game, people love playing it, and mostly (obviously) playing the most fun part of it. So how to catch more various pokes and playing against gyms? The answers were clear: GPS-spoofers and, as mentioned above, Tracking services.
GPS-spoffers are softwares that make the game think you're in another location, so you can go to pokestops and battle gyms more frequently, by simply "jump" from one location to another. This made growth faster, but its combination with tracking services made the gamebreak. By tracking software, people registered the pokemons they found in particolar places, so the playing crowd created various city maps with where and when to find the mons you needed. The consequence was the crowds ammassing, both phisically and virtually with spoffers, in varous locations, hoping to find their favourite pokemons, and made the famous "small city problem" even worse. Basically, for people who lived in small cities, the game became always harder, cause of the drop rate, wich was lower, both in number and in variety, than big cities once. Not to mention people not living in cities. they were lucky to find even the most common pokemons, since the drop rate was incredibly low. To reduce the problem Niantic itselfe moved against Trackers and closed lots of services. This made things seem ok for a while, but day after day, it became clear that without trackers and spoofers the game was going to die.

The final (unsolvable) problem

The final problem wasn't someone's fault. Like every phone game, you have to set a grind, else people will finish the game in no time. But this time, it was extreme.The game was too much a grind that gradually the initial hype gradually  lowered, and people began leaving the game. The battery usage of the game was another contributing factor, needing to recharge the phone very frequently, that some people, not having stellar battery phnes, left. By August, the player loss was already at 15 millions, and gradually, even with the continous updates, the playerbase fall. After 4 years, even if updates made the game better, only hardcore players stayed. And today, these players are so strong that it's almost impossibe to rise as a new palyer, for you will face a gym wich is ages ahead you. But i don't think the game itself was a complete faliure.

Was it only a precursor?

Even if its life was very short, the game itself was a revolution. It completely turned upside dow (even if only for a few days) the normal way we play and made us get up from our sofas and beds, and walk to play; it was a very wise idea, but the world was not ready. The mobile phones could not afford more than 2-3 hours of play, and the grind could be affordable if it was a bit easier. But the game changed the way we play, and i think this is only the beginning. Every decade or so, since its birth, gaming had a revolution. I think Pokemon Go was one of those revolutions, and we still have to understand what its effects will be.

What do you think? Did you have the Pokemon GO experience too? What's your opinion about next-gen GPS games? Tell us about it in comments!

coool dude

why cant this be easy

dipank001 i think it doesn't have pc version, would be difficult to get gps data

yeah someone walked infront of a car playing it

Never tried any Pokemon game, might as well give it a shot!

you should make an article about this

Hello pokemon go could be a good game depends

When the game released (June 2016), firstly only in Austalia, US and New Zeland, the hype was so high that millions of mobile phones all over the world were applied workarounds, meant to make Google Play think they were in countries where the game was released. People simply couldn't wait a couple of days more. And so, as expected, 100 millions of downloads (about France and Spain population put together, to have a sample), was a number to be reckoned with by the game's servers, meant to held only a portion of that impossible number. This led to the first, yet simple problems. Servers collapsed, but they were soon made more powerful and the game came back online. 8-9 days later, the game was released in almost all over the world, so the number of players connected to a single server went down, making the outage and crashes less frequent and rising the hype again. The game was reaching its apex, being one of the most popular on Play store. In its realease week, the game was the most popular in all the store, and its active players were more than Candy Crush Saga ones. It was definitely a success.

Hello how are you

Very good

How do you

Bye bye

Pokemon GO is maybe one of the most revolutionary game in history. First, having the ability to combine a traditional console game with the "new way" is just a huge leap forward in a world where most people have a gaiming console in their pocket, being the smartphone a huge and versatile instrument, which changed the way we play a lot. But this is only one major change in our gaming routine. Pokemon GO needed you to walk and run to achieve objects, thus theorically making you healthier, since sedentary is one of the biggest problems in our society. And lastly, there was the normal, tremendous love we all have for Pokemons. No one can escape it. After all, who doesn't want a cute jirachi to pet every now and then?

I love pokemom go

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Good cool very good very cool

When it was coming out, it seemed it could change the waywe play. But it had a short, even if intense, life.
We'll analyze what want wrong, and try to understand if this "new way" can still have a word in gaming world.

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i want to be rich in roblox

When it was coming out, it seemed it could change the waywe play. But it had a short, even if intense, life.
We'll analyze what want wrong, and try to understand if this "new way" can still have a word in gaming world.

Foarte Bine!