Review: Pokemon Go

Before I officially start this review, I have a short message for those who believe that adults shouldn’t be playing this game.

If you can sit there making fantasy football leagues and enjoy sitting down watching ESPN where grown men and women are playing poker, a very boring sport might I add, then that’s 100% your problem, not ours.

And with that mess out of the way…

Welcome to Pokemon Go!

Available on the Android and iOs operating systems, Pokémon Go is the beautiful love child of Nintendo and Niantic Labs. Niantic Labs is maybe not so well know for a game called Ingress, another GPS based game where the game play relied heavily on capturing nodes for your team. The difference here is that the nodes are Gyms.

The game doesn’t stray too much from the standard Pokemon formula that we know and love. A Professor Willow, introduces you to the world of pokemon and and asks you that all important question, “Are you a boy or a girl”?

Since I was sure that I didn’t wake up that morning more top heavy, I chose “Boy”, added my name and went on my way and went to catch my first Pokemon, Charmander and after a few levels my team, Mystic.

The game doesn’t automatically put pokeballs in your pocket to throw at small animals on the street (PETA would have field day with that….) so your method of catching pokemon is flick the pokeballs at the Pokemon, with your success on catching the Pokemon affected by a few factors; the color of the enclosing circle, the size of the circle and the type of balls you use; Pokeball, Great Ball, Ultra Ball.

If you want to be really fancy, you can use the AR – Augmented Reality – where you have to point your phone at the Pokemon to catch it but for those on the go, you might just have the function turned off.

Taking from Ingress, depending on your location, there are Pokéstops that will give you items when you are in the radius and you just have to swipe for the items. These items can range from Pokéballs, potions, or even eggs, which just like the previous Pokémon games, require you to walk to hatch them.

This game does a lot of things right – let me break those down. First of all, it’s Pokémon for everyone and then everyone else. For the 90’s babies, we have been waiting for this since forever…I counted. We have a chance to experience Pokémon in a new way, breaking us away from the handheld cartridge. We know these Pokémon. We have trained, traded, and battled with these Pokémon. We know their origin and remember when Ash first encountered each one. The nostalgia punches us and we are all too happy to take it on the nose. But that doesn’t mean that the game’s charm is lost for the older generations because their experience is…

They get a chance to jump into the Pokemon game with their kids and grandkids and not have to worry about EV’S, regions, or special items to have fun like we did to have fun or to have an edge. Plus, with the game being available on a smartphone, of which almost everyone has, the availability has skyrocketed. This game bridges the generation gap of the people who have been playing the game since Red, Blue, and Yellow versions and those who only know one Pokémon, Pikachu.

The next thing this game does well has to with title of the game itself, “Go”. The game encourages the player to go out and walk around to catch that Pokémon or hatch that egg. The fact that honest players have to walk and move their legs is a great thing. Perhaps, Buttonmashers, we can smash the idea that gamers are fat and lazy. The fact I’ve walked over 30km already with this game is amazing. I don’t even think about how much I am walking during the game but the number is amazing to me. I am sure at the end of this I am going to be one fit Pokémon Master.

Now not everything that shines is gold and worth putting on a pedestal like Lauren Faust. This game is still fresh though the people have had their hands on the Beta version for a while and Sweet Celestia there are some bugs. Pokémon Go is not exempt from this.

Let’s start with the most important ones, the game breaking ones… I call this one Schrodinger’s Pokemon

This one is called The Battle That Never Was

And last but certainly not least Stasis Ball

There are just a few of the more frustrating issues I had to deal with while playing this game. I know what you are going to say. Trust me, I hear you.

“Mr. Gamer, you’ve been looking great!” and “They’re going to update the game soon and fix it! We’ll have more battling and trading and it’ll be awesome.”

That’s great. That’s wonderful. While I am waiting for them to Make Pokemon Go Great Again, I still have to deal with connection issues and glitchy PokeStops. Forgive me if I can’t exactly wear that hat right now when a game that I want to love is making it very difficult.

But here’s the Breakdown.

Bugs and turf wars aside, this is still a good game. It is not the standard game that we are used to and that’s not bad. Look at Pokken Tournament. That game is nothing like the ones before it and it was deemed EVO worthy. That has to amount for something. I can love something and see it’s flaws. This game has a lot of them but I hope to stick it out to see this game even more.

Pokémon Go – Pokémon Go….have some fun!