Pokémon Mania returned this weekend, thanks to Pokémon Go

Pokémon Mania, the term the media dubbed the hysteria surrounding Pokémon back in the 1990s, is back!

Of course we Nintendo and Pokémon fans have never stopped loving Pokémon, but the mainstream public, media and world at large haven’t seen Pokémon this big since the original releases.

Pokémon Go has managed to hit the trifecta, reawaken older fans, find new Pokemon fans and even get the ‘approval’ from even some of the most diehard fans. We’ve all seen and heard the stories, you haven’t been able to go almost anywhere without running int a group of people playing Pokémon Go. Personally I’ve never seen to many people playing a game in public, let alone a Nintendo or Pokémon one in quite some time. It’s truly been a phenomenon.

It’s also crazy just how Australian-centric this has all been. While Japan and Europe don’t have the game (officially) just yet America does but still it seems to be Australia going crazy for it. Although it’s not the best time for mass gatherings in the US – we won’t go there.

Possibly the biggest sign of Pokémon Go’s success so far isn’t it’s spot on the App Store charts or even how much media it is getting, but instead Pokémon Go Walks and Meet-ups. The biggest and earliest one was the one in Sydney. Hosted by Guy ‘Yug’ Blomberg and Jess ‘Jiggsy’ Hodgson the walk went all around the most well known parts of the Sydney CBD, and several thousand people just so happened to join then.

Adelaide too got in on the action, we don’t have an mass group photos from that one but the local channel Seven news was there to report on it.

Proving that things do actually happen in Perth we also got several thousand fans attending the CBD here. Hosted by RFLan the well organised walk went all over the city, even the police managed to tag along and close down intersections for the procession to move along.  Crazy!

One of the coolest things we got sent this weekend actually happened in Wellington, New Zealand. It wasn’t a huge Pokémon Walk or march, it involved just two people who wanted to control a Gym. That gym though, is out almost in the middle of Oriental Bay. There’s no way to get it from the shore (unless your GPS is playing up). So how else to get it? Why not Kayak!

We spoke to the two girls, Kelsey and Lizzy who were at the helm of the oars;

On the first night it was released, we went for a walk along the waterfront to catch Pokemon and saw the gym on the fountain in the middle of Oriental Parade. It was the only unclaimed gym we had seen, so we tried to get it from the shore but couldn’t. We just threw out the random idea that we could kayak out in the weekend (we both work full time). On Saturday we went to check the gym, and yellow had taken it – but their Pokémon were weak. We went to Fergs, who hire out kayaks, on Sunday and asked if they would let us take a kayak out there. Turns out the guy working there was team yellow, so he was jokingly reluctant to let us team blues take the kayak. He said it was about 1.5 hr round trip, and neither of us had kayaked since we were 10, so we were a bit nervous. Turns out it wasn’t too hard to kayak out there, the hard part was simultaneously kayaking to avoid the fountains spray and the physical fountain itself, while simultaneously battling the gym. The 1hp bug caused us to be there for half an hour. When we were about to give up, it finally worked and we beat the gym in a couple of minutes and did a victory cheer.

Would they go back and get it again – should someone else kayak out there?

And we will probably go back to defend it, because it turns out kayaking is quite fun!

There’s of course people will will be negative about this kind of thing and already we’re seeing some negative stories about robberies, dead bodies being discovered because of the game.  But if you’re out at night and walking around with a smartphone, doesn’t it say more about society if you’re going to get jumped by someone using a game to ‘lure’ you in?

Being of the age that I saw this ‘Pokemon Mania’ the first time as a child, I remember the warnings then. Don’t go trade Pokémon with random people, don’t take all your Pokemon cards to school and don’t get ripped off with fakes. We live a more connected society overall, Pokémon Go is just one cog in the machine – yes it uses your camera, GPS and location – but if you’re safe you’re going to be fine.

Now, let’s all get through the boring workweek confined to out desk chairs and get exploring again next week.