For the second consecutive year, Niantic and The Pokemon Company have brought the annual Pokemon GO Tour event back to Pasadena, CA and to the Rose Bowl. The historic venue served as a spacious hub for trainers from across the globe to come together and experience a Pokemon event unlike any other. However, this year's event proved to be a much greater challenge for Niantic because of a disaster on the scale that nobody could have expected.
The Los Angeles area continues to recover from the effects of January's devastating wildfires. For days, the fires grew so out of control that even the Rose Bowl faced the threat of being caught in the growing inferno. Pasadena's stadium and its surrounding golf courses, where Pokemon GO Tour activities are held, were ultimately spared, thanks to the tireless efforts of L.A. firefighters and emergency workers. Still, some events that were scheduled for Los Angeles over the last few weeks had been postponed or canceled due to the wildfires. With the Rose Bowl so close to the origin of the Eaton Fire, it was fair to wonder whether Niantic should call this year's Pokemon GO Tour festivities off or push them back to a later date.
The developer has pushed on forward with Pokemon GO Tour: Unova taking place this weekend. There's a lot to be excited about, but there's still an uneasy sensation in the air due to recent events. To learn more about the decision to carry on with this year's celebration, Shacknews had the opportunity to revisit with Niantic Live Events Marketing Manager Angela Ferguson-Martins about the challenge of moving forward, Niantic's relationship with the city of Los Angeles, what to expect from the Unova edition of GO Tour, and how the team also worked to bring the event to Taiwan.
Source: Niantic
Shacknews: Pokemon GO Tour is back in the Rose Bowl for the second straight year. What made you want to come back?
Angela Ferguson-Martins, Niantic Live Events Marketing Manager: We are so happy to be back here at Rose Bowl Stadium. I mean, it's America's Stadium? I think it's one of the most iconic venues we've ever had and we have such a great partnership with the folks at the Rose Bowl Operating Company.
I think there's something really special, not only about being here at the Rose Bowl, but also being here in greater Los Angeles right now. I'm sure folks here know the wildfires that took place in January. It was a bit of a pain point for us, right? Like, is it safe to put on this event? Is it sensitive to put on this event? And, we're really happy that we're out here. We're supporting local communities. We have staff members out here working that were impacted by the fires. We're sending trainers out for citywide gameplay in areas to support local small businesses and local families. And of course, Niantic and The Pokemon Company made a $1 million donation towards wildlife relief efforts.
Overall, we're just proud to be here and we're happy to be bringing some light back to a community that was impacted, you know, so terribly last month.
Shacknews: I can't imagine that preparation was easy and the wildfires threatened so much of the county. At one point, it was even threatening the Rose Bowl itself. Was any consideration given to postponing or maybe even canceling this year's event?
Ferguson-Martins: A lot of decisions and a lot of conversations went into the decision to continue holding the event. We didn't take the decision lightly. We worked pretty closely with Los Angeles local authorities, Pasadena local authorities, of course, the Rose Bowl Operating Company, plus our partners at The Pokemon Company and The Pokemon Company International to make that decision. Please know that a lot of thought, a lot of care went into that decision.
We sketched out every option for us and, at the end, we decided this was the correct path forward and we're so glad to have so many happy trainers out. It's so great like looking over the field right now and just like seeing that we kind of brought L.A. together. I know we're just a small part of it, but it feels great and we hope trainers are feeling that today.
Shacknews: We know GO Tour has been a hit with the live attendees here, but it's also been a big hit with the city of Los Angeles itself. So tell me about some of the conversations with city officials and how they helped you prepare for this year.
Ferguson-Martins: Yeah, lots of great fun gameplay happening here in Los Angeles. And during Pokemon GO Tour, we really try to infuse a lot of fun back from the original Pokemon generations into our gameplay. I think two of my favorite things that we're doing here for Pokemon GO Tour: Unova is the experience we're doing at all of the Los Angeles Metro stops here in the city. We worked closely with the folks at the L.A. Metro and it is kind of nod back to the Battle Subway from Pokemon Black & Pokemon White. So, if you're at major Metro stops in Los Angeles, special Team GO Rocket Poke Stops will appear. You can battle them, get some fun Unova-inspired eggs, and that's a really fun citywide experience to partner on.
Plus, and a little bit of bias to this one because I like it, we have our enigma Field Research appearing throughout the city. So these are Poke Stops that will award you Field Research and then encounters with Pokemon who have unique special backgrounds. These special backgrounds are a nod to a certain character who I can't confirm from the Unova region, but I'm wearing some green to represent. It's been really fun to do those nods back and we hope trainers get where we're trying to go with some of those nods, really appreciate some of the attention to detail, and also explore Los Angeles while they're at it. It's been great.
Shacknews: Talk to me about how you worked with the city to make those Metro tour stops happen.
Ferguson-Martins: We worked with the Los Angeles Metro to kind of map out their system and decide what kind of stops and what routes made the most sense. Pretty specifically, we wanted to make sure we kind of dotted the route to get here to Rose Bowl Stadium from Downtown L.A. They were great partners in working on that map together. That has actually been live since the start of the current Pokemon GO season, Dual Destiny. So trainers have been experiencing this since December and it will go through the end of Pokemon GO Tour: Global next weekend, so lots of time to see that partnership come to life.
Shacknews: How else are you celebrating Unova and this era of the Pokemon franchise? Tell me about more about this year's GO Tour itself.
Ferguson-Martins: I think what trainers are most excited for this year is the debut of the fusion Pokemon Black Kyurem and White Kyurem. If you fuse Zekrom with Kyurem, you'll get Black Kyurem. And then if you fuse Reshiram with Kyurem, you'll get White Kyurem. These are long-awaited debuts in Pokemon GO and we're really excited to be bringing them to life here. Trainers can participate in Black Kyurem and White Kyurem raids, you can start to get those resources together to perform your own fusion, and you can unlock some unique attacks when you fuse a Kyurem with either Zekrom or Reshiram, so lots of fun there.
A couple other things that we're highlighting here, specifically, I want to call out that Deerling is making its Shiny debut during Pokemon GO Tour: Unova. That's here at the Rose Bowl and, of course, in New Taipei City, as you explore the four habitats, you'll encounter the four different seasonal variants of Deerling. It's not just one Shiny you're chasing this year, now you're chasing four. We've upped the ante a little bit, so that's been great. We hope trainers are having fun with that seasonal theme we've got going on.
Shacknews: This is the first year that GO Tour is in more than one city. So tell me about some of the plans for New Taipei City.
Ferguson-Martins: This is GO Tour's first return to Taiwan in roughly three years, I think, and it's been great. It's really fun, too, to be running these two events at the same time. Our team in Taiwan is having a blast. For a lot of them, it's their first time in Taiwan, so that's been fun. They are up at New Taipei Metropolitan Park in Taiwan running the exact same gameplay, the exact same habitats, the same raids, so it's really cool to be offering the same experience to two different groups of players at the same time and seeing how Unova is making its way around the world before GO Tour Global next weekend.
Shacknews: Given your relationship with the city, would it be reasonable to expect Pokemon GO Tour to return to Los Angeles next year and maybe even have it become an annual tradition for the city?
Ferguson-Martins: That's a good question, but I have nothing to confirm right now, unfortunately. We're definitely exploring lots of options all throughout North America.
Shacknews: Last question from me, what's next for Pokemon GO? It feels like a good time to ask that with Pokemon Day coming up next week.
Ferguson-Martins: I super hope trainers tune in to Pokemon Day. It's going to be a fun presentation. I'm looking forward to watching it. We set up a watch party at my friend's, so that'll be a fun morning. And, then, yeah, of course we're coming up on our 10-year anniversary next year, so lots of fun is you know coming down the line for Pokemon GO. Again, unfortunately, nothing I can confirm today, but just know we're excited to go bigger and better starting in our 10-year and even leading up to our 10-year. It's going to be fun, so hope people are excited.
Pokemon GO Tour: Unova will continue through the end of this weekend in both Los Angeles and New Taipei City. For everyone else, Pokemon GO Tour: Unova - Global will take place next weekend. For more details on that, be sure to visit the Pokemon GO website.
-
Shacknews
replyOzzie Mejia posted a new article, How Pokemon GO Tour: Unova is moving forward in the aftermath of the L.A. wildfires
