Pokemon Go

[Rommie]

So, anyone else playing this? (Yes Thumper, I already know you're not. )

I downloaded it to check it out as I enjoy geocaching and figured it would be enjoyable. And yeah, my boyfriend and I have the consensus that it's going to be enjoyable to play for a few weeks, but not sure how long I'll stick with it. For one thing, one pretty rapidly collects the basic, common Pokemon, and then it's a bit boring to keep running into the same ones.

One nice thing though is living in a city means you have a ton of everything you need in the game (ie stops, wild Pokemon, etc). If I was in the countryside, I feel it'd get a bit more boring more quickly.

[SciFiFisher]

Not yet. When the AWK (Angry White Kid) gets a little older I may give it a spin. He is very active and I think it may be a great way to let him get some activity that he will enjoy.

[Rommie]

Yeah, in the Netherlands it's definitely a kid dominated game compared to the USA- but then I guess it really helps that this is a country where it's totally normal for a pair of ten year olds to wander around town on their own, and that it's summer vacation.

When a few older friends of mine were all "kids these days" about this one, I pointed out that at least this craze sure as hell beats kids sitting inside with the curtains shut and the A/C running while playing video games like a lot of my generation did during summer vacation.

[SciFiFisher]

Yeah, in the Netherlands it's definitely a kid dominated game compared to the USA- but then I guess it really helps that this is a country where it's totally normal for a pair of ten year olds to wander around town on their own, and that it's summer vacation.

When a few older friends of mine were all "kids these days" about this one, I pointed out that at least this craze sure as hell beats kids sitting inside with the curtains shut and the A/C running while playing video games like a lot of my generation did during summer vacation.

Although when it is 106 degrees Fahrenheit there is something to be said for playing Mario Brothers indoors.

[pumpkinpi]

Yes. We were visiting my family in MD when it came out, and my 12-year old niece introduced it to Buster. If he hadn't seen it right away, we might have only heard of it and not gotten into it.

For now we're regular players. Like Rommie said, it is sure to peter out soon. Especially once Winter is Coming. But we're enjoying our nightly "Poke-walks." Buster likes collecting new characters, and collecting multiple common ones to evolve them into stronger forces! The goal for the latter is for battles in gyms, but for now that's a secondary interest.
I like finding them in interesting places and taking screen captures. Like one in front of the historic planetarium projector sitting in my office, and one in front of our in-construction planetarium. Oh, and one at the 45th parallel marker near my house.

My favorite character is Geodude.
http://www.pokemonpets.com/Geodude-Pokemon-Pokedex-74
Buster was has actually been into Pokemon cards for about a year (until the last few months) so he was a favorite even before this game.

[pumpkinpi]

There was a good meme on fb.
1990's: stop playing pokemon and get outside!
2010's: stop playing pokemon and get inside!

I've had fun seeing who else is walking around playing it. We see a few kids in our neighborhood, but also ran into a 50's something lady on her own! On a college campus there are tons of teens/20's people playing.

Buster heard from one of his day care teachers that "There's a Magmar at Como Zoo." (a free zoo/conservatory/arcade in the city.) We went there last Friday night and it was swarming with players!

[Thumper]

You people.

[Loresinger]

I got a phone for Paul - once the heat is more manageable we will take walks together with it. I like geo dude (some how I wanted to start singing macho man when I saw it LOL)

[Sigma_Orionis]

[Rommie]

40 different types so far. Interesting how geographic it is, when you live in a city you're unlikely to ever find new ones just walking the usual route home. Go even to another city though, and you will find a few new ones.

Heaven help me when I finally find time to get out to a park or similar!

[pumpkinpi]

I realized why Buster loves this so much--it's all about numbers. Each Pokemon you catch comes with its own "CP" or combat power. This is important for when you put your Pokemon in gyms to battle with other teams. Obviously, the higher the better. But it's not just CP--each has "HP" or hit power, too. That is the number of CP you can take away from your opponent with each hit. So you want a Pokemon with both good CP and HP.

But wait, there's more. Some Pokemon come in forms that evolve into higher level creatures. (e.g. Geodude evolves into Graveler evolves into Golem.) But you have to have enough "Geodue candy" to evolve. You get more by capturing more, and also by transferring it to another one. I've--I mean Buster has--caught 3 Geodudes. You get 5 Geodue candies for each capture so we have 15 total. We need 25 Geodude candies to evolve. So Buster knows we have to catch 2 more so it can evolve. You only get one candy by transferring--that works for some Pokemon that you can catch a lot more of.

So Buster is constantly looking at the Pokemon he has and figuring out how many more we need to capture to evolve. "Mom, you need to get two more Bulbasaurs!" And he makes predictions about how much CP and HP the evolved form will have.

I like it for totally different reasons. First, I like to stock his "Pokedeck" because I know he enjoys it so much. But second, I like finding hard-to-get characters and looking for new ones I don't have yet. The numbers part of the game is (surprisingly) meaningless to me.

[Rommie]

Yeah, that's funny, I'm definitely more on your side too- it's fun to catch the rare ones. No real interest in going to a gym to fight or anything like that, unlike most of my friends.

Have yet to spot a geodude though around here! And only one bulbasaur. It really is so regional- I have pretty much all the water stuff for example.

[Thumper]

"Hey, Mrs. T, I'm going to retire at the end of the week to follow my true passion: Spotting geodudes."

[Sigma_Orionis]

You must be at it already, We've got a geonuc right here