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The Tragedy of Pokémon Go: What it takes for good ideas to attract money

theatlantic.com

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Re: The Tragedy of Pokémon Go: What it takes for good ideas to attract money

#31

Post by laretluval »

Looks like this is the core argument for why Pokemon Go is a tragedy:

"""Even Google couldn’t make Ingress work without reskinning it as Pokémon. And while Pokémon is popular and basically harmless, the alternating reality it offers is still that of a branded, licensed, kiddie cock-fighting fantasy."""

I think the real tragedy is that the author of this thing can't lighten up and enjoy something that is making all kinds of people happy.

Edit: He even links to this example of why it is a wonderful thing! https://imgur.com/KAwwxFp But no, it's a tragedy because it's corporate-branded and juvenile. OK.

Re: The Tragedy of Pokémon Go: What it takes for good ideas to attract money

#32

Post by jack9 »

russellbeattie wrote: post #2

Well, from what I've seen, there would have been no other way for this app to be successful without piggybacking on the success of another company's obsessive fans. No other customer would put up with a game that is so badly made. From a developer's perspective, this app is a true disaster, with an amazing level of incompetence that permeates the entire launch. First, the servers have been going up and down like a yo…

> Second the app on iOS crashes every few minutes - I've never seen a more buggy app

Then I'll posit you haven't played many mobile games, much less the top 10 for the past few years. Blood Brothers 1 (as with most DeNA titles) was notoriously this unstable, for example.

Re: The Tragedy of Pokémon Go: What it takes for good ideas to attract money

#33

Post by manachar »

I'm not sure this a fair analysis. Yes, Pokémon certainly added a nice built in fanbase, but I don't think that alone would have made it the social phenomenon it currently is.

As the article mentions, the gameplay is significantly easier than Ingress. Also, the theme is much more family friendly and less paranoid. It's got cute pocket monsters you can collect throughout the day. Additionally, the camera aspect makes it built-in social sharing material, especially since it's a palatable theme.

I'm not going to share Ingress photos with anyone else, but a humorous picture of Magickarp flopped on the beach is fun to share.

I'm seeing a lot of people who are completely ignorant of Pokémon playing this game. I see parents downloading it to go on walks with their kids. It's fun, easy, and fits in nicely with people's aspirations (more exercise).

None of that was really in place with any of the previous iterations. They were all too "serious", dark, and/or niche audience.

I suspected Niantic expected this to be a moderate hit with Ingress players and Pokémon fans - both were a niche audience. It's the gameplay and family-friendly theme that has made this as popular as it is.

Re: The Tragedy of Pokémon Go: What it takes for good ideas to attract money

#34

Post by russellbeattie »

dleslie wrote: post #17
jimmywanger wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a reskinned Ingress, with simpler game mechanics. Log the damn errors and make sure it doesn't happen again? Have you written software? That is the most simplistic advice in the world. By your thoughts, all software should have been updated in a few days to be bug free. Had an update from the App Store? You realize that is gated by Apple and that you have to submit the update and wait an indeterminate amount…

Start with their choice to use Unity. It's a nightmare for its memory consumption and wasted CPU cycles. It is utterly unsuitable for an app that is concerned with battery life. I say this as an individual who has made something of a career out of fixing/polishing mobile Unity apps from utterly unshippable garbage to decent products. More than a few have called for significant native code accessed via the FFI, becaus…

Oh, I have to admit I assumed Unity would be more stable to use as it's so popular and self-contained. That said, I don't recall other apps that use it crashing so often! Any clue if Unity is the cause?

Re: The Tragedy of Pokémon Go: What it takes for good ideas to attract money

#35

Post by majormajor »

russellbeattie wrote: post #28
jimmywanger wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a reskinned Ingress, with simpler game mechanics. Log the damn errors and make sure it doesn't happen again? Have you written software? That is the most simplistic advice in the world. By your thoughts, all software should have been updated in a few days to be bug free. Had an update from the App Store? You realize that is gated by Apple and that you have to submit the update and wait an indeterminate amount…

Don't be condescending, I wouldn't have ranted or cared if I didn't have a clue. Others are commenting on game mechanics, lack of features or use of AR, but I'm not a game dev so I don't care. This app crashes so much, it must be some really obvious exception they're not catching. I don't expect it to be bug free, but constantly crashing ? Since you're obviously such a pro, let me ask you: Would you release software…

> Apple doesn't have contigencies for top-tier developers and emergency updates? Huh.

Thanks to the mysteries of Apple, sometimes your emergency update to fix a crashing bug takes several more days to get approved than the update that introduced the crash in the first place...

Re: The Tragedy of Pokémon Go: What it takes for good ideas to attract money

#36

Post by jack9 »

AznHisoka wrote: post #13
n0us wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well that answers it. If I can get the app to work long enough to reach level 5 I'll try that. It's a good thing they decided not to include that information from the start. They wouldn't want people to think there might actually be something fun to do.

Their Onboarding is horrendous. It took me awhile to figure out how to actually capture a Pokemon.

Took me exactly 0 seconds, since I had played trash toss and basketball toss games before. The whole 3d avatar customization is wasted effort, at a glance. It will lead to vanity items later, obviously, but why have it in the game at all right now?

Re: The Tragedy of Pokémon Go: What it takes for good ideas to attract money

#37

Post by CydeWeys »

AznHisoka wrote: post #13
n0us wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well that answers it. If I can get the app to work long enough to reach level 5 I'll try that. It's a good thing they decided not to include that information from the start. They wouldn't want people to think there might actually be something fun to do.

Their Onboarding is horrendous. It took me awhile to figure out how to actually capture a Pokemon.

The onboarding is like SnapChat's -- nothing is explained, a lot of the functionality is hidden, and you have to learn about it from your friends or by looking up how-to articles online. I've already compared notes multiple times with random strangers I've met while playing the game.

Re: The Tragedy of Pokémon Go: What it takes for good ideas to attract money

#38

Post by russellbeattie »

paulsutter wrote: post #26
russellbeattie wrote: post #2

Well, from what I've seen, there would have been no other way for this app to be successful without piggybacking on the success of another company's obsessive fans. No other customer would put up with a game that is so badly made. From a developer's perspective, this app is a true disaster, with an amazing level of incompetence that permeates the entire launch. First, the servers have been going up and down like a yo…

For such an awful app, you certainly seem to use it a lot.

As I said, that's 100% due to Pokemon (and a couple relatives who are rabid fans). Any other app would have been deleted after the third crash.

Re: The Tragedy of Pokémon Go: What it takes for good ideas to attract money

#39

Post by Animats »

Majestic was a great concept, but unfortunately, it launched a few weeks before 9/11. Here's the trailer[1] and press kit[2]. You can see why this was a problem after 9/11. It's still a problem - before 9/11, there was no government department looking for vaguely suspicious activity, and the police were not as militarized.

Majestic's slogan was "it plays you". It played on its schedule, not yours. The pressure made it more compelling, but limited the potential audience. It was like having to be on line for a raid in WoW, or LARPing.

Pokémon Go is a casual augmented reality game. It's not even multiplayer. Simple wins in casual gaming. (Angry Birds, anyone?)

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PcTDMYq3xCw [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yG0oY8obuGU

Re: The Tragedy of Pokémon Go: What it takes for good ideas to attract money

#40

Post by andyjdavis »

laretluval wrote: post #31

Looks like this is the core argument for why Pokemon Go is a tragedy: """Even Google couldn’t make Ingress work without reskinning it as Pokémon. And while Pokémon is popular and basically harmless, the alternating reality it offers is still that of a branded, licensed, kiddie cock-fighting fantasy.""" I think the real tragedy is that the author of this thing can't lighten up and enjoy something that is making all ki…

Personally I have no problem with stuff being corporate branded and/or juvenile but I am surprised that the cock-fighting element isn't mentioned more often in relation to Pokemon. Maybe it is because I have seen a little real life cock-fighting (and its horrifying) but I find that aspect quite repellent.
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