Holocaust Museum and Pokemon

¶ … app came out in 2016, Pokemon Go took the world by storm, turning everyone's neighborhood into an augmented reality play zone. The Niantic developers enjoyed an incredible amount of media attention in the initial few weeks after the app's release, but interest in the app subsided even within the first several months of its release because Pokemon Go is not a very good game at all. Just a few months after the app was released, it has "increasingly disliked by its own fans," (Morrison and Steinblatt). Although it seems cute and fun at first, Pokemon Go is a bad app because it is buggy, it is actually dangerous, and because there is no actual game play.

The Pokemon Go app is buggy, which is one of the main reasons why smartphone users have been ditching the game. It is possible the developers prematurely released the game or that they simply did not have the capacity to create a smooth interface, but whatever the reason, reviews of the app show that it has consistently "glitchy gameplay and constant crashes," (Morrison and Steinblatt 1). Brewster also points out that the app is bad because it drains smartphone batteries fast, and because it has a poor caching and server access performance. A bug-free app is necessary for it to survive; no matter how cute the concept or the graphics, no one wants to play a game that crashes all the time.

In addition to its buggy play, the Pokemon Go app is bad because it is dangerous and even offensive. Unlike most games, the Pokemon Go actually requires the user to walk or move around in any area they are in. While this feature is great in terms of it encouraging people to explore cities, communities, and nature, and while it may also help reduce the harmful effects of a sedentary lifestyle, what also ends up happening is that people who use the app are completely absorbed in their device and end up not looking where they are going. Users can walk into objects like trees or street signs, walk into each other, or even step out into traffic and get hurt. Not only are the potential problems with Pokemon Go hazardous, the problems can also be harmful in that the Pokemon Go gyms and other augmented reality situations are located in places like a Holocaust Museum and the DMV between North and South Korea (Morrison and Steinblatt). Encouraging users to play a silly app in locations that are sensitive shows how bad Pokemon Go really is.

Pokemon Go is a bad app also because it has no actual game play, something that users might have appreciated at first, but which became annoying. The game is silly. Professional reviewers have said as much; Kollar states that Pokemon Go "doesn't exactly have a lot of gameplay, in any sense of the word," (1) and Brewster also claims that while Pokemon Go can be a fun experience, it is "not a good game (1). The critics are saying this because all the app does is interface with the GPS system to allow the user to capture and control creatures with no overarching structure that would make the game meaningful.

It is true that an app and especially a game does not have to be meaningful, and that Pokemon Go's augmented reality is interesting especially when someone tries it for the first time. The good points to the app are that it does encourage people to get out and move around more. Augmented reality is also a fascinating concept that could be integrated more with good apps. Ultimately Pokemon Go is a bad app with no staying power.