‘Pokemon GO’ to Feature Gyms, Other Details Revealed

In an interview with VenutureBeat, Niantic’s John Hanke and Mike Quigley revealed various new details about Pokemon Go, including that it will feature real-life Pokemon Gyms. Check out the full interview for all the details. Here’s the main points:

• Ninantic (the game’s developer) has raised $30 million in funding from Google, Nintendo, and The Pokemon Company.
• Pokemon Go will be made so that it can be played everywhere, from small towns with a 1,000 person population to larger areas like San Francisco. If the game could only be played in large areas, it would alienate most populations, so they wanted the game to work well everywhere.
• There will be Pokemon Gyms! Just like in the real games, you can train and level up your Pokemon here. However, Gyms will be hard to find, so you will want to make use of every one you come across.
• Pokemon will be readily available almost as soon as you walk outside of your house – you can usually encounter a Pokemon within five minutes, though it might not be the rarest Pokemon. This means that no matter where you are, you will always see a Pokemon. There will be a population of Pokemon living near every player.
• Different Pokemon will live in different parts of the world. For example, Water Pokemon will be in areas with lots of water. Legendary Pokemon will be in very few locations.
• You will have to trade Pokemon with other players to catch them all unless you plan to travel the world (and they expect there will be dedicated individuals who will actually do that). You can always trade with a friend in another area to get what you need though.
• The “Pokemon Go Plus” device will vibrate when you’re near a Pokemon. After pressing a certain button sequence, you can capture that Pokemon and look at it later on your app.
• There’s a large possibility of live events for Pokemon Go, similar to what Ninantic has done for Ingress. (Imagine if The Pokemon Company partners up with retailers or businesses to offer special Pokemon at their locations – would be a good way for TPCi to make money. /theory)
• There will be a Team function where you can be part of teams with other Trainers and compete against other teams. How this will work was not detailed.

What I want to know is if the Pokemon in the game are going to be transferable to the main series games. And if they are, don’t many of us have most Pokemon already? Will there be something different about the Pokemon caught in these games if you can transfer them?

Or… is the whole point of Pokemon Go to treat it as its own standalone thing? As in, it doesn’t interact with any Pokemon titles at all, and you’re supposed to complete the Dex once again? Can we even battle other Trainers in the traditional sense of a Pokemon game? I guess I just don’t fully understand the concept of this game yet since they haven’t really given us a full picture. It might just be like a lite version of the main series games, but involving the actual outdoors, more social and exploration aspects, and being its own isolated game.