Straight Creepinā, or: Deciding To Go With Pokemon GO
Wednesday, 9:05 p.m. ET: My Twitter timeline is filled with horrible news, and with people (it seems to me) understandably desperate to escape that news by sharing screenshots and avatars from Pokemon GO, which has just been released in the U.S.. I piously ignore them, and read more about the news.
9:10 p.m.: I visit the app store. Not for any reason. Just to see. I note that Pokemon GO is free, in the sense that it features āin-app purchasesā which of course means, if one is even the tiniest bit obsessive, that it is anything but free. Un-free. Anti-free. There is free, and there is its polar, anti-matter, negatively charged opposite, and that is this game. No thank you.
9:12 p.m.: I download Pokemon GO.
9:13-9:18 p.m.: I name and build my avatar. The options, in terms of designing my look, strike me as appallingly limited. I can choose only the color of my skin, hair, lumpy unflattering jacket, I-Love-the-90s cargo shorts, sneakers, backpack and jaunty ball cap. I am particularly miffed that I cannot even alter the tilt of said ball cap from ājauntyā to, for example, ārakish.ā If the developers are on their game, they will make this option an in-app purchase.
9:19 p.m.: The gameās tutorial begins by informing me that āThere is a Wild Pidgey nearby!ā I hold up the phone and see that ānearbyā is an alarming understatement: A cartoon bird-like thing is here, two feet before me, fluttering above my living room rug. It is PIDGEYING FROM INSIDE THE HOUSE.
Gotta Catch āEm All, Or At Least A Few: A Pokemon Neophyte Tries 'Pokemon GOā
Image:Ā Pokemon Company/Niantic
