Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Pokémon GO: The Data Behind America’s Latest Obsession

similarweb.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 342 posts

Re: Pokémon GO: The Data Behind America’s Latest Obsession

#11

Post by niftich »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #7
kdamken wrote: post #6

I think people will look back on this game as important, as something special. I've been playing video games for over twenty years, and I can't remember the last time something felt quite as exciting as this. Each time I've gone out, I've seen other people walking around playing, and everyone gets the same goofy smile when you ask them if they're playing Pokemon too. It shows the potential for AR games, and I think i…

Ingress was as exciting as this. And it was a lot of fun running into other players (friendly and enemy) and spotting them from a few dozen yards away. I still regularly talk to people I met on the Ingress scene, including one enemy player who was, at the time, my "archnemesis" of sorts. I did meetups with other local players to takeover large areas as a group and stuff as well. But yeah, version 2 is cool too, I gue…

No doubt Ingress was exciting, but it was a new AR/VR concept and an original sci-fi plot, putting it in the same ballpark demographic as a AAA video game.

Pokemon GO has the advantage of being based on an multi-billion dollar, 20-year-old franchise. Its appeal goes beyond that of a typical videogame, so has a significant leg up over Ingress in people's hearts and minds. Its popularity will eventually segment into a hardcore group and a mainstream group, but its mindshare among the wider population is likely to remain strong.

Re: Pokémon GO: The Data Behind America’s Latest Obsession

#12

Post by MBCook »

The amazing thing to me is that, at least on iOS, the game is pretty objectively bad.

Of course that hasn't stopped me from sinking a lot of time into it this weekend. I've spent $10 on it, which is easily a record for free to play game for me.

The server issues are one thing, but the game doesn't even get lots of basic things right. If the server goes away, or sometimes if I'm just out of the app too long, I have to log back in. It seems to forget my settings for weather I want sound and music on, or to use the AR functions. I've run into numerous crashes and graphical glitches. Input getting confused requiring app restarts. Poor handling of the (common) network/server issues.

One of the mechanics requires walking around, which it won't track outside the app despite the fact that iPhones have had motion coprocessor for years. So they offer a special mode (very poorly documented) that basically turns the screen black and tries to reduce power usage a bit. But you have to keep the Pokémon app open to track steps.

I am having fun. I REALLY hope they can fix these issues. I sought earlier today that they do plan to add Pokémon trading and expand the functionality of the various waypoints in the world. I'd also love to be able to battle my friends.

The social aspect on this just amazes me. In the last couple of days they're been numerous times when I saw a random people clearly playing this game. Guys walking around parking lots at work, cars parked at empty banks that were closed because there happened to be a gym there. Numerous posts on social media about random gatherings and flash mobs because of something going on in the game.

It's clear that Ingress had a pretty good idea. Tying it to a major brand (not unlike the way Mario kart was created) that really encourages the collecting aspect and getting it out on iOS at basically the same time have clearly made a huge difference.

I'll also say, is a Pokémon fan I'm glad that it's only the 150 original in the game. At this point there are way too many Pokémon that seem the same to me, so I'm glad to see my old friends instead. I imagine that'll change someday but this is a good start.

Re: Pokémon GO: The Data Behind America’s Latest Obsession

#15

Post by blacksmith_tb »

droopyEyelids wrote: post #3
ro_sharp wrote: post #2

I'm in Australia, and I've never seen an irl viral phenomenon on the streets like this. In the inner city of Brisbane, every second person I see is staring at their phone, swiping up to catch Pokemon. Mobs of 100+ people chasing 'lures' are being moved on from parks in the middle of the night. And there was a pub crawl: https://www.facebook.com/events/267390546965461/

Same thing in America. I remember the first night it was released I was walking to the grocery store and it was almost like a low-key street festival going on. People of all ages, genders and races on the streets running around with their phones. I've never seen anything like it.

I just came back from a walk to a large nearby park, and there were dozens of people playing. It struck me as interesting they were mostly groups of friends, and not people playing by themselves.

Re: Pokémon GO: The Data Behind America’s Latest Obsession

#16

Post by gre »

alexmingoia wrote: post #9

Let's wait a month to see what engagement looks like. Most people are downloading simply because everyone is talking about it - especially news media

Engagement is crazy right now. I drove home at 3am last night and stopped by a PokeStop, and as I was leaving the parking lot, another car pulled in just to play... Same at the church by my place 15 minutes later. Different car.

What will really be telling is how many people still play after a week or two.

Re: Pokémon GO: The Data Behind America’s Latest Obsession

#18

Post by bpchaps »

Has anybody gone through their privacy policy? The speed that this became viral and the possibilities to have an enormous amount of people take video all over the place gives me the heeby jeebies.. Some of the things in the policy sound very, very invasive.

https://www.nianticlabs.com/privacy/pokemongo/en/

Edit: Heh, I went on indeed to see if there was a spike of video analyst jobs and got this awesome ad on the right: https://imgur.com/MMyjbQN

Re: Pokémon GO: The Data Behind America’s Latest Obsession

#19

Post by MBCook »

niftich wrote: post #11
ocdtrekkie wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ingress was as exciting as this. And it was a lot of fun running into other players (friendly and enemy) and spotting them from a few dozen yards away. I still regularly talk to people I met on the Ingress scene, including one enemy player who was, at the time, my "archnemesis" of sorts. I did meetups with other local players to takeover large areas as a group and stuff as well. But yeah, version 2 is cool too, I gue…

No doubt Ingress was exciting, but it was a new AR/VR concept and an original sci-fi plot, putting it in the same ballpark demographic as a AAA video game. Pokemon GO has the advantage of being based on an multi-billion dollar, 20-year-old franchise. Its appeal goes beyond that of a typical videogame, so has a significant leg up over Ingress in people's hearts and minds. Its popularity will eventually segment into a…

One of the big problems with Ingress was it wasn't available on iOS until maybe a year ago.

Since Google made it I don't exactly blame them, but that was a huge chunk of the market. I wanted to give it a try and I'm sure there were tons of other people but we couldn't since we didn't have Android phones.

That's not an issue with Pokémon GO.

Re: Pokémon GO: The Data Behind America’s Latest Obsession

#20

Post by MBCook »

gre wrote: post #16
alexmingoia wrote: post #9

Let's wait a month to see what engagement looks like. Most people are downloading simply because everyone is talking about it - especially news media

Engagement is crazy right now. I drove home at 3am last night and stopped by a PokeStop, and as I was leaving the parking lot, another car pulled in just to play... Same at the church by my place 15 minutes later. Different car. What will really be telling is how many people still play after a week or two.

I feel that if they don't get the server issues under control soon (I saw they delayed the European lunch) then it doesn't matter what WOULD have happened the game is going to lose players in the social/network effects won't be there.
Post reply on HN