Even if you are not familiar with the ins and outs of the media franchise known as Pokemon, the chances are good that you’ve at least heard the name. Created in 1995, Pokemon began as a video game for the humble Nintendo Game Boy handheld called Pokemon Red.
In it, players traverse a mythical land, trying to catch “pocket monsters” of widely varied appearance and ability, then “train” them to defeat other monsters in battle. It’s since spawned a legion of video games, animated television series, trading cards, and other media, becoming the second most successful video game–based franchise in the world. It’s second only to Nintendo’s Mario series.
And this was before July 6, 2016, when the Pokemon Go mobile app was released to the world and quickly rose to dominate, well, seemingly everything. It took five hours to climb to number one on the download charts after its release, over twice as fast as the previous champion.
Here are some things you may find interesting about this instant phenomenon.
10. It May Overtake All Social Networks
