I don’t actually own a phone capable of playing this game, but it looks a lot more fun than most ways adults entertain themselves.
I’m sure there are a lot of self-conscious men who have some kind of idea of what “man behavior” is who will wait for this concept of gameplay to be made more “manly” by replacing the pokemon creatures with deer or zombies or ISIL dudes.
You fucking did it, now I’m giggling like an idiot.
Now that is one edgy comment.
A war of words. It’s supposed to be less violent or something.
I am a middle aged fart who has never played a Pokemon game in his life, and I’m enjoying Pokemon GO. You’re required to get out and explore your city to play it, and there’s whole elements of the game that necessitate walking a lot, which is great. In my area, every night, there’s groups of 30-50 people gathering in parks and public squares to play it; everyone from kids to grown ass men to old ladies are walking around catching Pokemon and talking about their games. It’s a genuine cultural phenomenon, and this is before huge parts of the game have even been unlocked yet (like trading your pokemon, etc)
Nearly everyone I know is playing it. I just don’t use a cell phone enough to justify owning one that costs more than a few dollars and I use a prepaid because it winds up being free (consumer rewards program type deal).
Very understandable. It’s both a battery hog and a processor hog. Even phones a few years old aren’t beefy enough to really play it very well, sadly. It runs well on tablets with just data plans, however.
Here’s something worth mentioning:
Not only will you get shot while using this app, but all of your personal data will be accessible by the developer.
I’m surprised this hasn’t been picked up by BB yet because this is a scary overreach of permissions and the fact that you’re not warned about this is loathsome at best.
ETA: Looks like @doctorow finally picked up this story
The only acceptable things for grown men to play with are cars and balls. Small white balls, big orange balls, kinda-oblong reddish brown balls. Balls you can hold in your hands, balls you smack around with a paddle, balls you hold close, balls you try to send as far away from you as possible. But balls, damn you! BALLS.
Please! It’s Pokemon Bro!
There is Ingress for those who find Pokemon too cutesy. You pick a side and hack portals, run missions and stuff I’d know more about if I remembered to play more than once a week.
It’s been out a while and has a pretty decent following. It’ll be eclipsed by PokemonGo because of the built in market, but it’s also more stable.
Man, no one tell my boyfriend this. I met him through a gaming convention.
Edit: inserted ‘one’ into the sentence.
I don’t have a problem with people playing Pokemon Go. Several of my friends are playing and they seem to be having a great time with it. I was going to advocate Geocaching, however, perhaps not as an alternative, but as an adjunct activity. Hell, as long as we’re all running around looking suspicious and peering at our various devices and/or GPS receivers anyway …
As far as playing Pokemon while black … yeah, I can too easily imagine that as a problem although I sincerely wish I couldn’t. I’ve told the story on BB before, about where I was out geocaching in a park near some houses in a fairly suburban area.
I was acting suspicious, as described above. After I found the cache and emerged from the woods, heading back towards my vehicle, I saw two police vehicles slowly circling around the park, a motorcycle and a cruiser. As soon as they saw me, the cycle made a beeline for me, while the cruiser took the path around to come up behind me. I’m Caucasian, but I was also dressed kind of like I might be crawling around in the woods, for some reason. Short version: they found out I was caching, ran my licences, found nothing, and laughed about it, then let me go.
I very well aware of how this could have played out differently. It’s white privilege, but I also think that this is how the interaction should go for everyone, all the while knowing that it doesn’t … not even close. I really hope that none of these stories come up again with the seemingly removed.
It’s very easy for me to believe playing these games while black could get a guy killed. I’ve gotten hassled for playing while white-and though it hasn’t ended with bracelets or a ride in the back seat of a squad car, I can easily see how it could have, that or worse.
That was while playing Ingress. I am hopeful that the sheer volume of younger players, and the publicity around this newer property, will serve to inoculate the easily alarmed somewhat. The more people get out there looking ridiculous with their phones, the more normal it will seem.
Both Ingress and Pokemon GO are made by Nyantic; GO uses the same basic portal structure as its predecessor. So definitely, if you like the idea of GO but want it less cutesy and more portal-hacky, check out Ingress.
“We don’t stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing.”
-George Bernard Shaw
Are you referring to the ‘you just don’t lead them so much’ comment? I used to work with a hyper-violent gun nut who thought that line was the pinnacle of wit, and explained it to me in depth (it was his favorite joke to tell at lunch, ‘how can you kill women and children’). ‘Leading’ is a marksmanship term referring to how far ahead of the target you aim when the target is moving, I believe. So it’s kind of an inside gun nut/military joke.
I was referring to the “with subtitles” part of the “Full Metal Jacket - Kill Women and Children with subtitles” title for the video, because semantics is fun.
Oh, ha. Well sorry then. I will look into this ‘fun’ you speak of.
