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Pokémon GO: The Data Behind America’s Latest Obsession

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

#161

Post by donkeyd »

avree wrote: post #160
donkeyd wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yet Nintendo market cap gained 7 billion on Pokemon Go alone. I wonder if these investors really have no idea that the tech behind the game is Niantic and that Pokemon isn't even completely owned by Nintendo, or that there's something I'm missing here.

Pokemon Go is magnitudes larger than Ingress, their previous project, even though it's been plagued with more issues than Ingress and is arguably not as fully featured. The difference? Pokemon, which Nintendo owns. If I was an investor, I'd view the potential for licensing the Nintendo IP (something Nintendo has been extremely reluctant to do in the past) as a huge potential growth vector for a struggling market segm…

True. Nintendo, of course, has a lot more IP than just Pokemon that they could license for all kinds of stuff. And the people who grew up with their games are now earning money, so they can actually buy the licensed material. Good point.

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

#162

Post by wccrawford »

MBCook wrote: post #12

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…

If you eliminate all the server issues, the game isn't "objectively bad".

In fact, I quite enjoy it. It's a little simple for the first few levels, but that's how Pokemon games have always been!

Once you level up your character, you'll start getting harder Pokemon to catch and you can start trying to take and hold gyms. And you'll get enough candies to start upgrading and evolving your Pokemon as well.

To put it plainly, this is the first mobile game in years to get me really excited about getting out there and doing things. Ingress was okay for a while, but never amazing. Zombies Run! had issues that I never got over, and I just quit... And it wasn't really compelling anyhow.

But this? My wife and I repaired the tires on our bikes after years of saying we'd do that, and we've been on multiple bike rides already. I'm quite looking forward to continuing that trend, and without the Pokemon aspect, I know it wouldn't happen as often, if at all.

So no, it's not "objectively bad". It's quite clearly compelling and enjoyable for a lot of people, just maybe not for you. And that's perfectly okay on all accounts.

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

#164

Post by rickyc091 »

eva1984 wrote: post #130

Well, doubt how many will remain after 1 month.

I'd imagine people will stay as they did with the original Pokemon. To this day, they are still adding more and more Pokemon. I'd expect they'd treat this game in a similar fashion. They'll probably introduce trading (already confirmed), a battling system amongst peers, side objectives, events (battle Mewtwo) as we saw in the commerical, etc.

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

#167

Post by wccrawford »

BillyParadise wrote: post #64

Yeah, but will it get me laid?

If you count meeting people and possibly getting to know them to be a first step on the path to that, then yes. It's very easy to see who's playing the app nearby, and people often get talking while they're trying to take over a gym over waiting for spawns near a lure.

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

#168

Post by cocotino »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #119
abstractbeliefs wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's already been noted that the application itself doesn't verify the validity of TLS certs, so it's trivial to MITM the connection and there are currently people working to learn the ins and outs of the API.

It verifies certs, it just doesn't pin them. So if you can hack your phone, you can hack it, shocker. Not a security flaw.

No need to hack anything, just install your own cert

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

#170

Post by Betabot101 »

georgeecollins wrote: post #39
MBCook wrote: post #12

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…

Speaking as someone who has helped develop two extremely successful mobile games "objective" goodness is pretty meaningless. People have more patience than you expect for a game that captures their imagination and will put up with buggyness. In the long run, if a game isn't polished it will lose because of retention. But pure technical polish is often overrated.

Agree, just look at DayZ. Players stuck with that through extreme buggyness. Sure it might not have the same number of players as it once did but there were periods during which players were putting up with a lot of bugs.
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