Flinty has been getting more visitors than usual this summer. While he may be enjoying the increase in company, it’s not visitors wanting to see the famous statue who are flocking to its base.
Flinty is one of two PokéStops in Flin Flon, which explains why the locals clustered around him tend to be found on their phones.
What are they doing? If you’re not in the PokéKnow (not an official game term), it may seem incomprehensible that people of all ages are gathering in real-world locations to play a virtual-world game.
Patryck Benoit, 9, is an avid Pokémon fan who is now playing Pokémon GO. The newest entry into the Nintendo franchise, Pokémon GO is an augmented reality version of the game played on a phone or mobile device. Pokémon Trainers (that’s the players) follow maps on their phones to visit locations in the real world where they can discover new creatures to collect.
Patryck likes the game, he says, “because it helps kids have more fun and get outside more.”
It’s a single-player game, but still friends can help each other get ahead.
“People can add lures to Pokémon stops and they can work together for that time,” Patryck explains.
Flinty is a Pokémon stop, or PokéStop in game speak, as is the fish mural at Super K in Creighton. When a lure module is set off at one of these stops, there is a window of time in which more Pokémon than usual appear in that place.
‘You’re helping people get more Pokémon too,” Patryck says of setting off a lure.
Patryck’s mother, Tanya Benoit, is also playing the game.
“The young ones love it,” she says, “but people my age love love love it.”
Benoit started playing last Sunday at 9:30 am. She had set herself up with the US-based app but was pleased to find that a Canadian version became available earlier than expected.
She likes that the game is one she can play with her kids, and that it takes them out into the real world. “I think it is one of the greatest things for a kid that’s not active, that likes these games.”
She says Patryck has been into Pokémon since he was four or five, and has collected hundreds of cards. So far in Pokémon GO, he has collected 34 creatures and 11 eggs.
The eggs are hatched by walking, which is one of the ways the game encourages activity. Eggs come in 2 km, 5 km and 10 km versions, and will only hatch from movement under 32 km/h.
“So for young kids like my youngest son, Patryck, for him to hatch a 10 km egg, he walked around the park and our neighbourhood for 10 km,” Benoit says. “So my 9-year-old son did 10 km in a day.”
Her older son Korey, 13, plays the game as well.
She says the walking requirement has benefits for parents, too.
“Obviously I can’t send my 9-year-old out, besides in our neighbourhood, to go for a walk,” she explains, “and if he wants to collect Pokémon I have to go out and walk with him.”
Another benefit, perhaps counterintuitively for an electronic game, is that it is helping players meet new people.
Benoit describes a visit to the PokéStop earlier this week at the Flinty statue, at the Flin Flon Tourist Park and Campground, where a young couple had set off a lure module.
“There were 30 of us standing around, waiting for Pokémon to come to us, and we were collecting,” she says. “And we were all chatting and having a good time and it was fun.”
Arron Christie is another Flin Flon resident who is playing the game. He began playing before the Canadian launch date by downloading the app using an American Apple ID.
He has caught more than 500 Pokémon, collecting 80 different types.
For him the game has a strong nostalgic element, since he played Pokémon as a child.
”It’s mostly people who have grown up with it, or even a lot of adults who have their kids that are doing it,” he says.
Christie echoes Benoit’s assessment that the app is helping gamers be more social. While gaming at home can have a social element that comes from voice contact with other players, Pokémon actually gets them out of the house. “You’re actually out and about socializing with people, even though you’re playing the game solo,” Christie says.
Christie also noted the effect the app’s launch has had on Nintendo’s stock price.
Reuters reported the stock doubling between the game’s launch on July 6 and Tuesday, July 19. Stock price fell slightly Wednesday before rebounding Thursday morning.
Christie says the only thing missing is a PokéGym, a designated spot where players can train up their Pokémon so they advance more quickly. He says it’s rumoured there’s a PokéGym in The Pas, although its location is not confirmed. Prince Albert is said to have several PokéGym locations.
Christie is heading down to Winnipeg in a couple of weeks, “so I’m really excited for that,” he says.
Is he going to spend some time at the PokéGym?
“Yeah, probably,” he says with a laugh.
