Pokémon Go Craze May Be Over But Not Its Impact

By Massita Ahmad SINGAPORE, Oct 4 (Bernama) -- The Pokémon Go craze may have abated but the free-to-play, location-based augmented reality game on handheld devices has left a lasting impact worldwide. Even the uninitiated took the trouble to get to know of Pokemon, the fictional creatures that players seek using a smartphone app at real-world locations. Rolled out in July 2016 by Niantic Inc, it witnessed a strong following with many trying to download the game even before its official launch. YouGov, the global market research firm, polled 10,808 online consumers across Asia Pacific (APAC) to investigate how popular the game was and how the game changed the social behaviour of people who play it. According to the poll, majority of APAC respondents have heard of Pokémon Go and found the concept interesting. The game made the Pokemon character more popular. 88 percent of the respondents across the region have heard of Pokémon Go, with highest awareness levels in Hong Kong (97 percent) and Indonesia (97 percent), and the lowest in China (57 percent). Less than two in five of respondents (37 percent) were Pokémon fans before the launch of the game, now seven out of 10 respondents (69 percent) in APAC know of Pokemon. DELAYED LAUNCH TRIGGERS MORE INTEREST IN POKÉMON GO? Half of the APAC respondents tried to download the game even before its official launch. In APAC countries except Australia, where the game was launched much earlier, almost half of respondents (49 percent) tried to download the game before the game was officially launched in their respective countries. One third of Pokémon Go players spent 30 minutes to an hour a day playing the game on average. Looking at the impact of Pokémon Go on the players' social behaviour and daily lives, 56 percent of those who have downloaded the game put the app icon on the first screen of their smartphones. Over half of them (52 percent) have played one to three times in the past 24 hours, and around one third of respondents (33 percent) spent 30 minutes to an hour per day playing game. POKÉMON GO ENCOURAGES OTHER SOCIAL MEDIA USE? About 44 percent said playing Pokémon Go made them use other social media more often as they wanted to share their progress on the game with others online. Almost half of the players (48 percent) said they would still spend the same amount of time playing this game once they understood the game better. However, 7.0 percent of respondents have stopped playing the game already. Within this group, one in three (36 percent) think it's too time consuming and they do not have enough time to play. About half this number (18 percent) said they did not find it interesting at all, and 8.0 percent said they did not know how to play Pokemon Go. FLASH IN THE PAN? Augmented Reality: the combination of virtual and real worlds is a key reason for the Pokémon Go craze. Almost 80 percent of the respondents found the combination of virtual and real world made Pokémon Go fun to play. Half of respondents (50 percent) think the game is interesting because they can have fun gaming and being outdoors at the same time. About one third of the respondents (34 percent) liked the game as it allowed them to socialise over the net. For 28 percent of the respondents, they always loved Pokémon and this game added their fondness for the character. Meanwhile, among the 31 percent of the respondents who did not find the game interesting, almost half (47 percent) said they did not see any reason for the hype over the game. Just over one in five (22 percent) of respondents said they have privacy and security concern as the mobile game needs to use their camera and geolocation functions. YouGov, an independent, publicly listed global insights agency, is one of the most recognised and quoted names in research across UK, Europe and North America. It is expanding quickly throughout Asia Pacific. -- BERNAMA