If you’ve been closed in your room and haven’t accessed the web in the past week, then you’re missing out on the biggest gaming phenomenon of the decade(probably!). Pokémon Go, the augmented reality game that was released last week has taken the internet by storm.
Its having a massive social impact as people are now more busy tweeting and facebooking about their Pokémon grabs, rather than uploading filtered pictures on Instagram.
Pokémon Go has brought together a whole hoard of people to visit places and explore parts of the city they’ve never before. Users have gone nuts and walked so much after the launch of this game, that reports of leg cramps in the United States are at a peak. This is the massive effect of the rebirth of the 20-year old cartoon series in a new-age AR avatar.
According to a report released by SimilarWeb, the app has already caught fire in the countries it has been released in, including United States, Australia, Japan and New Zealand. And what’s even surprising to notice is that the number of daily active users of the game are already close to surpassing those of the micro-blogging platform Twitter on Android (Much WOW!!).
Within just two days of the release, the app has already been installed on 5.16 per cent Android devices in the whole of U.S, and this number doesn’t include the number of apk installs in other countries(which is as high as a million downloads). And within moments of the AR games’ launch, it shooted to the top spot in the Google Play Store. In this short span, the app has also managed to garner more Android app installs than dating and match-making app Tinder(standing ovation!).
This is like a data nerds dream come true. The staggering app install data of the game is also accompanied by the data for the usage time of the game and it’s absolutely believable that the users are spending so much time with their favorite cartoon characters.
According to the data, users on an average are spending 43 minutes, 23 seconds a day — walking, catching Pokémons and fighting Gym battles to win batches. This is more than the average time a user spends on either of the social media apps, including Snapchat, WhatsApp or even Facebook.
Pokémon GO even though not released globally has still become a major phenomenon, straying GenX away from virtual interactions on social media and getting them to meet in real life. This is surely helping teenagers open up and harbor real-life relations with other Pokémon trainers they meet in the streets.
Skyrocketing Stock Prices
As evident from the aforementioned data, the Pokémon Go AR game has been an instant hit. And all this frenzy and chaos hasn’t gone unanswered by Investors who are seeing huge potential in the gaming app. Nintendo’s share prices have toppled market expectations, and seen a jump of 25 percent(which is as high as its daily gain limit) in just a single day.
In a strategy to expand reach beyond their own hardware consoles, the Wii, the company has forayed into launching an augmented reality game based on their most-famous anime title. Wii might have been a one-hit wonder when it first launched around 2007 but as mobile games gained popularity, the consoles were kinda phased out.
But, Nintendo seems to gaining back the momentum and has already added $7 billion to its market cap, it had lost in past five years. This is the company’s biggest gain since it started trading 33 years ago, and we don’t hope this phenomenon to end anytime soon. But seeing the company’s track record with one-hit wonders, the investors shouldn’t get so hyped by the incessant downloads and five-star ratings.
To expedite on the overwhelming response, the company is also planning to soon add a feature that allows trainers to exchange(or trade) Pokémons with each other. The mastermind behind the development of this application, John Hanke, CEO of Niantic Labs adds that, It’s kind of a core element.
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