View from the Cheap Seats is an extension of the newsroom, which is frequently a site of heated debate on topics ranging from the extremely serious to the utterly ridiculous. This web edition features the views of print edition columnists Thom Barker (Wednesday) and Calvin Daniels (Saturday), as well as web exclusive content by Michaela Miller (Thursday) and Devin Wilger (Friday).
This week: What is your opinion of the Pokemon craze?
No, except... nothing
Try as I might, it is pretty hard to ignore the Pokémon Go craze. Just the other night, when I was driving by the Court of Queen’s Bench on Darlington Street at around nine in the evening, there was a crowd of about 30 people milling about.
I have never seen that many people there even during the most contentious trial in the daytime.
Apparently, our venerable courthouse is a good hunting ground for whatever the heck it is Pokémon players are looking for.
I’ve been asked if I am going to try it and the answer is, ‘no, I am an adult.’ Maybe it would be different if I had grown up with the Game Boy version, but I was already 35 when it came to North America. Now I’m 53; I’ve earned my right to be curmudgeonly about these things.
As Douglas Adams’ rules regarding our reactions to technology goes: 1. Anything that is in the world when you’re born is normal and ordinary and is just a natural part of the way the world works; 2. Anything that’s invented between when you’re 15 and 35 is new and exciting and revolutionary and you can probably get a career in it; and 3. Anything invented after you’re thirty-five is against the natural order of things.”
Actually, I’m pretty neutral about this particular fad. I think it goes way too far to laud it as the greatest boon to public health since sports, but at the same time, the fears of the conspiracy theorists are also way over the top.
It definitely has some benefits. About three days after the app was launched, my younger son—who is almost 30, ugh—called me up. He said he learned more about the City of Lethbridge in three days than he had in the previous four years since he moved there.
There are also some drawbacks. The most disturbing thing I’ve seen is a video in which an adult male actor was able to lure two young teenage girls into his car with a Pokemon ruse. There are some inherent dangers to this, but life is dangerous.
-Thom Barker
A novel way to get exercise.
Take away all of the ‘90s nostalgia and cute monsters and Pokémon Go does one very specific thing, it incentivizes walking. Everything about the game is designed to make you want to walk somewhere. The suggested locations, or PokéStops and Gyms, are mostly local landmarks, often places with interesting details or history – in Yorkton, one of the places it will lead you to the heritage plaque that talks about the Bronfman legacy in the city, for example. Much of the game’s content is walled off behind distances you need to walk before you can unlock it. The entire interface is designed to point out where things are that you might walk to with the expectation that there might be a monster to collect or a landmark to look at.
It’s a program best experienced with someone else, going out with my girlfriend had us going from place to place, talking about the sights we saw, pointing out interesting buildings or talking about the landmarks in town. Sure, it didn’t always work right, and somehow managed to point out real life tiny dogs with a surprising frequency, but it didn’t matter because we were out exploring. We tried to rescue a stray cat (which hid in the bottom of a building which we couldn’t access), we took a break for a lovely dinner at a local restaurant, met people who were also looking for the little beasts, and we walked over 5 kms. As nights together go, it was a good one, and we managed to get some exercise in the process.
It also has the potential to benefit local groups. There’s a stop at the Godfrey Dean Art Gallery, for example. At stops, people often drop lures to attract Pokémon towards it, drawing crowds to the landmarks. Could curious Pokémanics be tempted to go look at some art while they wait for the little beasts to pop up? Would they be tempted by the prospect of arts and culture and when they’re looking for creatures? I think some might be, and that would be a great way to get more people in the gallery.
I’m not sure how long the game will last, it’ll have to keep adding landmarks, Pokémon and content if it’s going to continue to be relevant. But it’s a fun way to take a walk in town, and go to parts of the city that you might not otherwise think to explore. Sure, some people don’t look where they’re going, and some people take it way too seriously, but for us, it is a novel way to get a bit of exercise and go for a nice walk on a lovely summer evening. Who could possibly complain about that?
-Devin Wilger
Loving the idea
Cultural crazes are always fascinating, the hula hoop, yo-yo, Rubik’s Cube, the pet rock and dozens more.
Not surprisingly the latest craze is related to cellphones and gaming.
The cellphone, an apparatus few ever actually use to have a vocal conversation with another person for, has become a gaming platform. That part is not new as access to games such as Farmville, Clash of Clans, Candy Crush, and dozens of others attest.
But quickly eclipsing all of the aforementioned games is Pokémon Go.
Social media is of course abuzz with the new cellphone app-based game. Most of the people posting complain about the game, a seeming minority as the rest of the world is out-and-about playing it.
And therein lies the core greatness of Pokémon Go, and I say this without having played it.
Computer/cellphone games generally have people hunched over a video screen of one kind, or another. That effort is usually made in the comfort of a chair inside. It is the typical view of a gamer in their basement playing video games.
Pokémon Go is still a video game, but its premise requires players to get out and walk around, in the daylight, searching for the little critters that have been around for years now based on a Japanese franchise that has included TV shows, card and video games.
It is the ‘get out and be active’ aspect of the latest Pokémon craze that sets it apart. The game marries the traditional video game with aspects of geocaching, and that means an active gamer is emerging.
Participation has long touted that even walking a block a day is good for one’s health. Pokémon Go promotes that by wrapping it in a game so that people are lured to be active for non-traditional reasons.
The allure of finding Pokémon is also creating a new tourism as well. Larger centres generally have more of the little critters to find, so people are travelling to search.
Add in some unique interaction opportunities when players gather at key ‘training centre’ sites, and you add another positive to the game. Even as I write this a customer and a server at the restaurant are talking recent captures.
And, among video games Pokémon Go is non-violent, which also should be seen as a good thing.
Are there concerns? Sure some take it too seriously and it impacts their jobs, but that can be said of pool in the 1950’s, and PacMan in the 1970’s. Society survived.
The positives of Pokémon Go simply far outstrip the negatives, and I for one applaud what the exciting new tech is heralding.
— Calvin Daniels
