Tuesday 12 July 2016

What is Pokémon Go?

 The Nintendo-owned franchise, Pokémon, is making a comeback through Pokémon Go –an augmented reality app game which has become hugely popular. Pokémon first blew up in popularity in the late 1990’s, and it has been reborn in the form of a free download app on Android and iOS devices.

Pokémon Go is everywhere at the moment, and its popularity means that it is on the verge of surpassing Twitter in terms of daily active users on Android. Niantic Labs teamed up with The Pokémon Company and Nintendo to launch the Pokémon brand in mobile platforms. The game has evidently become revolutionary in familiarising augmented reality to the public in the consumer electronics markets.

Niantic founder John Hanke stated:

“We're excited that Pokémon fans and gamers can now start exploring their very own neighbourhoods and cities to capture Pokémon using the Pokémon Go app”

Pokémon Go works by using your phone’s GPS and clock to detect your location in the game and make the Pokémon “appear” around you on the phone screen. As you move around different Pokémon will appear for you to catch, depending on your location and the time. The concept of the game is to encourage users to travel the real world to catch the Pokémon in the fame, and this combination of the game with reality is the first form of augmented reality which can be used by anyone (if the app is available in your country)!

The best part of Pokémon Go is that it’s free, and this is partly why it’s so popular. Although virtual reality has become one of the biggest trends in technology since last year, it has not been so freely available to the masses until now. It is not the first augmented reality game and will not be the last, however the huge previous success of Pokémon, and the fact that original Pokémon fans are adults now, gives the game a sense of nostalgia and boosts its popularity.

Pokémon Go is currently available in the United States, New Zealand and Australia. It has not been officially released yet in the UK, however there are rumours it will be coming out in Europe and Asia this week.

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