On Thursday, hundreds of gamers gathered in New York's Times Square to battle a giant Mewtwo – a decade after the Pokémon Go trailer first teased the augmented reality experience. The event marked the game's 10th anniversary, a milestone for an app that has been downloaded more than a billion times and still draws millions of daily players.
Released in 2016, Pokémon Go quickly became one of the biggest mobile game launches in history. It uses GPS and augmented reality to overlay digital creatures onto a live view of the real world via a smartphone camera, sparking a craze that saw people flock to parks, waterfronts and shopping malls in search of Pokémon.
“10 years on, Pokémon Go has over a billion downloads, millions daily players, and wedding invites from fans who met through it.”
"By allowing you to take your mobile phone out into the world to discover virtual creatures, Pokémon Go helped realise the millennial dream of becoming a Pokémon Trainer," said Matthew Reynolds, editor of Pokémon news website One More Catch.
Michael Steranka, vice president of product at the game's publisher Scopely, says the Pokémon Go experience has always been about bringing people together. "Pokémon Go will always start with community – we think we're only scratching the surface here," he said. "We often receive wedding invites from players who met through Pokémon Go... because it's been such an integral part of their relationship."
The game's popularity has endured. It has hosted major live events in more than 60 countries, averaging more than 400,000 attendees a year since the first Go Fest in 2017. Scopely estimates players have explored over 100 billion kilometres while playing Pokémon Go – roughly 334 round trips between the Earth and the Sun.
UK content creator j0beats runs one of Twitch's biggest channels dedicated to the game and regularly travels to events like the one in New York to meet fellow players. "People always think it's crazy that you travel all over just to catch some pixels," she said.