Back when Pokemon Go was announced I thought I might give it a try. I didn’t think it was going to be that big of a deal. I figured I might get my roommate to play for a little while and maybe meet a few other players. In the past few months I’ve barely heard anything about it’s upcoming launch. I didn’t even hear about the beta test.
Then a couple of days ago someone posted a screenshot of the game. Then my roommate came home a level two trainer. Then I found the Facebook group for my city with just over two hundred members (there’s probably a couple times that many in the city). Then a girl I work with walked into the break room and caught a Zubat before our shifts.
You obviously don’t need me to tell you game has exploded and I love it. Well, I love the game but I hate the scorching Texas heat. I’ve only gotten to level six because of app glitches. I lose the ability to connect reliably to the servers in the afternoons. It might partially by my phone because my roommate’s Iphone doesn’t have the same problems.
I especially love how it’s created a common activity for people to bond over in real life.
When I got off work tonight, I held a mini Pokemon Go seminar for a couple of the girls in parking lot.
Then later, I went to pass by the three pokestops, all located at churches, near my apartment to get more items. As I got close to the first one, I noticed someone had put a lure on it to attract more pokemon. I caught a bulbasaur as I walked up to it. I said “Hi.” to the two 18-25 ish guys next to the parked pick-up. One of them noticed I had my phone out and called out, a little uncertain, “Hey, are you playing a game?” I smiled, flashed him my phone which was still on the pokestop and said, “Yep, Pokemon Go.” They told me I could stay and take advantage of the lure but I wanted to hit the other pokestops first.
On the way back they were still there, along with another car full of Pokemon Go players, one of whom called out, “Hey Pokemon girl.” I stopped and chatted with them about the pokemon in the immediate area (mostly Dodou and some others but mostly Dodou).
On a side note: I find it interesting that there are places where you find a lot of one kind of pokemon. Our mall, for instance, is full of Zubats.
I really hope the server issues get fixed so my walk to work can at least count toward hatching eggs. I missed out on a little more than a kilometer today.