Madison Powers

Sophomore. Mass Communications Major.

When I was a kid, I loved the game Pokémon. Not sure why, but the thought of being able to pick a lifelong best friend and to go on adventures really intrigued me to the games. So, in 2016 when they announced they would be bringing Pokémon to life through a game called Pokémon Go, it made me extremely happy. My favorite Pokémon was coming to life in their own way!

My first Pokémon game was called Pokémon Y, which had a legendary you would eventually obtain called Yveltal. He was a crazy looking Pokémon and was hard to catch, but as time went on through the game, he slowly became my favorite legendary in the Pokémon universe to this day. But as soon as I beat the game, I was waiting on a new game to play, but as I was waiting on a new Pokémon game, I really got into collecting the Pokémon cards for the trading card game. So, what started as a hobby in high school — getting a few packs of cards here and there — ended up with a collection of over 700 Pokémon cards.

Pokémon Go seemed to unite people, as lots of people joined in the game. Once I got this game, I was at the Gainesville Square almost everyday after school. And in doing so I have met some awesome people that you wouldn’t think loved Pokémon just like me. I was and still am very shy, so for me being able to socialize and find people who have similar interests was life changing. I felt like for once I wasn’t alone and that there are people like me who share my interests. And through this game I met my lifelong best friend and to this day we still play this game together.

But when COVID – 19 happened there were many drastic changes to the game as Niantic (the creators of the game) wanted to do their part and support social distancing. So, they made it to where you could play the game from home, which was very difficult depending on where you lived. But they achieved their goal in making the game playable from the comfort of our home.

With the game now being easily accessible for everyone, hopefully more people like me can break out of their shell as they are searching for their virtual adventure with their Pokémon.