Pokemon Go, the augmented reality game where players collect in-game items and catch Pokemon characters or monsters, could either be the best thing to happen to gamers and travellers or the biggest social disaster waiting to happen.
I found myself having near collisions with people in Melbourne. In the city centre, there were so many monsters appearing that it’s hard not to get excited and completely forget where you are. And when the person coming towards you also has his or her nose buried in their device, well, that’s an inevitable head-on collision.
With its high density student population, it is inevitable that Pokemon Go would be a hit in Melbourne. I saw students playing it on the trams. “Quick, let’s get on this tram, there are monsters here,” I heard a boy cry out to his friends as he elbowed his way onto the vehicle.
On the streets where people hardly look at each other anyway these days, they are looking even less. At street corners, you see groups of friends gathered around with their devices, playing the game.
Two days ago, there was a news report that a woman “out playing Pokemon Go was killed after being hit and dragged 70 metres down the road by a stolen car”.
In Sydney, it’s created such commotion in neighbourhoods that a day ago, a local council won a battle to have one of its local parks removed as a a Pokestop. The Peg Paterson Park in Rhodes, which is surrounded by apartment buildings, was a designated Pokestop and it drew so many hunters that residents lodged complaints that they were causing traffic jams, noise pollution and leaving rubbish in the park.
I downloaded the game as soon as I landed in Sydney – for research purposes of course – to understand what the fuss was all about. It may have taken the developer John Hanke 20 years to create the overnight sensation it has become, but clearly this is the biggest breakthrough in gaming and mobile that we’ve ever seen.
At the Hotelsworld conference in Sydney, Morris Sim, CEO and co-founder of Brand Karma, a virtual reality content company, called it a defining moment not just for augmented reality but for mobile. It gets gamers out into the streets and interacting with the world and shows the true potential of the mobile device we carry with us with the right content and applications..
I can see the potential for travel on the go. Walking through the Royal Botanic Garden to NSW Gallery to catch the Frida Kahlo and Diego Riveria exhibition, I opened the app and while I did catch a few monsters, I was also informed about the historic stops along the way. I learnt for example that the Lion Gate Lodge was built in 1878 and is a Victorian sandstone building. Okay, you can just look up and see the sign but if today’s travellers have their noses buried in their devices anyway, why not alert them to what’s out there if they looked?
Pokemon Go at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Sydney
The information is rudimentary currently but you can see the potential for elaboration and for attractions to embed relevant information into the game.
In the US, Alltherooms.com has introduced a new filter called Pokeview which “allows the user to see the type and number of active Pokémon, PokéStops and PokéGyms within a 150 meter radius of each and every property (hotel, vacation rental, houseboat, couch or castle) across the entire planet”.
According to this New York Times article, “the website, which aims to function like the Google of accommodations searches, compiling all rooms available in a location from Couchsurfing and Airbnb accommodations to hotels and houseboats, also notes the proximity of stationary Poke “gyms” and “Poké stops,” places where players may spend more time”.
I tried the game around the Chippendale neighbourhood in Sydney where I was staying and while there aren’t too many characters lurking around there that evening, I found a couple in the Kensington Street Social restaurant and in my room at the Old Clare Hotel.
Monster alert in my room at Old Clare Hotel Sydney
When I told general manager Timo Bures about the monster in my room, he was surprised. He’s not sure yet what application it can have for his 62-room boutique hotel but you can see he’s struggling with the idea of actively attracting Pokemon Go hunters to his establishment.
In the US, some hotels have embraced the game. The New York Times article states that “the historic Hotel Del Coronado near San Diego is home to seven Poké stops, the Peninsula Tokyo has two Poké stops including one at its 24th-floor restaurant and the Hotel Nikko in San Francisco has a Poké stop in its Kanpai Lounge, offering a Pokémon happy hour from 5 to 7 p.m. daily with $5 cocktails”.
Now whether this is a fad or a fad that will build into a trend, who knows at this stage. We live in a world where people are lurching from one tech fad to another but it is clear there is something going on – a generational change coupled with a technological shift is rocking the fundamentals of how we engage with our devices, the web and the world.
