I must say that I see both sides of this. On one hand, the game does allow one to venture out into the environment and potentially discover places that had been below their radar. After all, who would be willing to go to an abandoned building in the middle of nowhere? That “civic engagement” thing sort of bothers me, though. Urban spaces (regardless of how run-down they are) can be assigned value in their own light within a certain context (usually involving a personal experience). Official landmarks, on the other hand, have widely accepted value due to their cultural and historical significance. Because this is so, I do not think that the value of these places should be reduced down to nothing more than hotspots for a 3-month old videogame.
A sliver of the saturation coverage of the game at the time suggested it was somehow awakening players to aspects of their environs that they’d previously overlooked. The game requires moving around physical space, often on foot. This, it was argued, “could be an interesting way to tour a city” and “you may get to know new places or people.” Not only that, the urban techno-utopian case continued, Pokémon Go fosters a “a kind of civic engagement” that is “actually making cities better places.”
Pokémon Go in the Lower Ninth Ward
Rob Walker
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