Pokémon has been an immensely popular part of pop culture for over the past two decades - spreading its craze across video games, anime, trading cards, movies, and more. In 2016, the phenomenon saw an enormous surge of new fans after Niantic released the popular augmented reality game -
Pokémon Go.
Many of the locations that are Pokéstops and Pokémon Gyms in the game are also interesting locations in the neighborhood - whether they be pieces of art, museums, military locations, parks, and more. For fans of the franchise this was a welcome addition to the
Pokémon world, but for many people who were in the unknown about the phenomenon - such as police and military officials, Niantic's popular game set up quite a bit of confusion.
After the game launched there was an increase seen in civiliants entering military facilities which caused a lot of misunderstanding in the officials. Now, three and a half years after requesting them, CBC News has received documents which give us insight into what the state of the military confusion was during
Pokémon Go's initial outbreak. Check out a few examples of some of the e-mail exchanges between the military officials below.
"Plse advise the Commissionaires that apparently Fort Frontenac is both a PokeGym and a PokeStop. I will be completely honest in that I have not idea what that is," - Maj. Jeff Monaghan at CFB Kingston.
"The game's premise seems to be going to the 'PokeStops/Gyms' to collect 'Pokemon's' (we should almost hire a 12-year-old to help us out with this) of which we were able to find 5 of these things on the range road itself," - Security Expert David Levenick at CFB Borden, Ont., 100 kilometres northwest of Toronto.
"There's a game out there taking off like gangbusters, and it requires people to move to digitally cached locations to get points, etc.," - Lieut. Col. Richard Raymond at CFB Petawawa, west of Ottawa.
Another official mentioned that they had already found at least five of the "mythical digital creatures" while someone else made a comment that kids were climbing on tanks. A complaint was filed in July of 2016 stating that the game would endanger the 22 Wing's mission. Elsewhere, at CFB Halifax officials instead recognized the potential the game offered and Rear Admiral John Newton made the following recommendations.
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Remove the PokeStop from the Dockyard Gym, because "it presents a security risk."
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Add a PokeStop at the Stadacona Gym, because "this addition, with the already existing PokeStops at the museum and the admiral's residence, would increase the museum's attendance."
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If possible, upgrade the museum PokeStop to a Pokemon gym to increase traffic.
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"Life and work are best accomplished if there is good fun, health and friendship. If Pokemon Go enables these values, while we protect our interests, then we all stand to marvel at this intersection of technology, gaming and health."
You can't argue with any of that, and now that these documents have been released alongside with the upcoming Wayfarer ability from Niantic, we can only hope that more military figures will follow suit in the future, ultimately increasing the playing field of
Pokémon Go. Meanwhile, have you taken the time to try the new buddy adventure feature yet? Your Pokémon companion can now join you on the map bringing along a bevy of features such as feeding your friend and having them join you when capturing.
Check out the full trailer for the upcoming
Pokémon Go Buddy Adventure feature in below!
Experience Pokémon in the real world with Pokémon Go! You never forget your first Pokémon partner. Share your journey with it again with the new Pokémon GO Buddy Adventure feature!
Pokémon Go is currently available on iOS and Android.