Pokémon Go Special Report – A real journalist discovers that it’s still popular

When Niantic shut down the third-party maps like PokéVision that players were using to actually, you know, find and catch pokémon, many people were of the opinion that Niantic had in fact f***ed it, and it signalled the death knell for Pokémon Go (an opinion that seems mostly based on some reddit users asking for refunds). Nintendo’s stock will momentarily cease to rise, as it still is, and plummet to below zero. Lovecraftian horrors will stalk the land. Most importantly, though, everyone who said Pokémon Go was rubbish to begin with will be proven gloriously, finally right. I, going out in the wild to catch an exclusive like a real journalist, went to Holland Park and found that this does not appear to be the case.

Holland Park is a bulbasaur nest. Almost everyone there was very obviously playing the game. I cannot overstate the percentage, here. It was genuinely confounding. They were mostly in groups – couples, friends, families all running around together – or sat on the grass taking a break. I was turning on the spot, observing everything in disbelieving wonderment like a Disney character, at the precise moment someone found where the coveted mammal had spawned. A bearded guy who was actually wearing his cap backwards started striding up the slope yelling “Yo! Bulbasaur! Bulbasaur!”. Dozens had their phone tethered to a portable battery in their bag or pocket. I spoke to a few different people and everyone was ticked off at Niantic to some degree.

Toby and Marlin were on their summer break before going back to university. Toby said he was more annoyed at Niantic’s lack of communication over the changes, and that he couldn’t see how the third party maps made the experience worse for anyone: “They fixed the game,” he said. Toby and Marlin had been walking, on average 17 km a day for the past couple of weeks. Toby had a beasty watch strap tan line, and Marlin, smoking a cigarette and completely deadpan, said “I used to be white. I’ve overdone it a bit.” Sakshi and Sankalp (both using a battery pack in Sankalp’s pocket in an adorable, couple-y way) described the changes as “horrible” and said “it makes it really hard to play the game.” Matt (standing chatting to Alex and Dom, all notionally grown adults spinning pokéballs to get curve shots) said he understood why Niantic had done it, but didn’t believe it was anything to do with servers: “It’s monetisation. They want to be able to control that more.” Imi, Thiviyaa, Charlotte, and Kate, a chatty, engaging group of students about to enter the final year of sixth form, described the changes as being annoying.

Here’s the thing though. Everyone I spoke to had still all come to the park that day specifically to play the game anyway. I realise there’s some statistical bias to this i.e. obviously nobody there playing the game would be not playing the game, but I’m not sure I can make you realise the sheer number of people there, doing laps of a Japanese garden meant for ‘quiet reflection’. Only two people I spoke to had ever been to Holland park before – Dom said that it does get you visiting places you might not have ordinarily and he had, in fact, never met Alex and Matt before he ran into them that day. Anyone claiming that Niantic has ***ked it has, themselves, f***ed it, by failing to accurately take into account human nature.

If this third-party thing isn’t going to stop people playing, will anything? The answer seems to mostly be ‘my attention span’, as about half expected their interest would naturally die off (Sankalp gave himself about a month). Matt pointed out that Pokémon Go had been rolled out with summer and called it gone by the end of the year; Alex expected new features to come with winter, but that ultimately it would still die on its arse. “Battles and trading,” he said. “I think that’ll save it for a few months.”

The other half, though, are evidence that Pokémon Go will keep enough active users over time to sustain itself (and this was all before Niantic started trialling a new Nearby system). A few, like Charlotte, even see themselves in it for the long haul. “They’ll bring new stuff in so even if I get bored they’ll bring something in to get me to keep playing,” she said. “If the weather is bad you can still catch on the way to school.” I’m not sure why there’s a keenness for people to stop enjoying a thing they were hitherto enjoying, but somewhat inconveniently it seems, they, er, aren’t. What a bunch of bastards.

Thiviyaa added “It’s a new way of gaming for this generation.” And she wasn’t on Team Instinct, so you can trust her judgement.