I put it on my iPad and tethered it to my phone since it doesnt have data. But its not hugely practical to walk around with the tablet.

 

I downloaded it to my phone earlier today, and caught the Bulbasaur(14), because why change tradition. There's a blue stop, about three minutes walk from my house, but I hadn't thought you could see to the horizon on the map, until I saw your pics.

There's also the war memorial about 20 minutes away, but I see nothing else. Outskirts of a little village in the middle of nowhere has nothing... Which isn't a surprise. I'll head down into the village proper tomorrow morning or later today, and see if there's anything there.

Also, just tested on my tablet. You can (at least with a google account) switch devices no worries.

I used a fragrance 5 minutes ago, and just left the tablet in the same place. So far, I've had:
Eevee (13)
Weedle(10)
Pidgey (10) (three of them. Two were XL, and the other knew twister)
Drowzee (72... So I know my main, apparently)

But the noise to let me know they appeared isn't a pokemon cry, it's just a ping, so you have to actually be aware when using it.

Reddit has shown how to check where local to you would likely have pokestops, but I don't know for certain how good this is. If it's true, then there's three more at a single church near me, and then about five on the walk to the memorial. And the train station should be a gym. I'll update when I know more.

 

Yeah I live in the suburbs (sorta) so where I live there isnt a lot, 2 blue stops with in a mile each way. In the centre of town thought there was something every 50m.

I topped off today with an Alakazam at level 278.

 

Daaang, nice Alakazam. I've played for a bit over an hour today before my phone battery died and my best is a 113 slowpoke

Im in Utrecht in the Netherlands which is a decent sized city and there is TONS of pokestops here. All the little playgrounds in the neighborhood have 1 or 2, all the parks have up to 5 etc.. and I havent been to the city center yet! This means that so far it doesnt seem necessary at all to spend money on this game, i have 162 pokeballs now instead of the 50 i started with.

 

I'm happy because I finally found a dratini in my neighborhood- it looks like mine spawns them, because I've seen multiple and caught 2!

Taken over 2 gyms now, one through force and the other was already aligned with my team. Make sure to always put a dude in a gym if you can, because you get bonuses (every 21 hours, its in the upper right of your shop).

The landmarks in my area are hilarious. Like pictures of pirates painted on walls.

Also as I type this a wild bulbasaur appeared next to me! SWEET!

 

Like most games you can play with out, Money would just make it faster.

 

Caught a Pidgeot during a smoking break, and a goldeen while hetting back. Couldnt find the fucking Oddish and Crabby that appeared in my tracker but grabbed an Execute that appeared in my bedroom, lol.

Also, there are dozens of Doduos near my home, is that normal?

 

So I've heard rumblings through facebook that Niantic are banning people with the APK file. Either device bans, account bans, or both. It looks like it was kicked off by this tweet, and the fact that the servers crashed because people were going mental over downloading it.

As of nine hours ago, nobody has been banned yet. Apparently.

A load of 'journalists' reporting on this, and the rumourmill is in full flow, with essentially the same article being reprinted everywhere, sometimes with additions from Reddit (which doesn't know any better either).

Consensus seems to be "it's probably nothing, but it might be worth deleting the file if you didn't get it legitimately, just in case".

 

Not necessarily. I haven't seen one Doduo. On the other hand, my work is apparently the place to be for Venonat. So I'm happy.

 

Caught a charmander and a Bellsprout near my home but haven't been able to get on since because of server clogging. Well, unless I'm banned for apk.

 

Damn, this game makes me want to tell stories about my neighborhood.

The "Ghost Bike" near my house where someone was killed years ago by a driver is Pokestop, and there's something just damn awesome about it.

Every morning I go to the gym at 5:30. Across from the gym is a church, and it's a Pokemon Gym. There's also a gym down the street from me. These shall be my domain.


So I've been running on the treadmill for hours every single morning for years, now. As convenient as the home-running is, I might just take it outside and become the best there ever was by using my cardio time for pokemon hunting.

My phone is dying because of this game, though. Need accessory watch.

 

I don't actually think anyone's had it happen to them - Americans on Reddit are saying they had the APK, and once the game came out for real they just continued to use it. No issues at all.

So I've still got it on my tablet. But I've kept my phone free for now.

 

What does having the APK actually do for you?

 

It gets you a copy of the game in areas it isn't officially released, without having to change your location settings, which can wipe data from other apps.

 

I'm pissed that I accidentally picked the wrong team- Literally every gym in my area is Team Red, but I chose Team Blue before realizing that.

My area is flooded with Tentacools and Psyducks, with the rare Dratini/Staryu/Eevee around (I have yet to actually catch a Staryu, but I see them on the tracker). This is on top of the standard Pidgey/Rattata around me.

 

Just picked this up, haven't even battled yet.

Was there a way to pick your starter Pokemon? Because if there was one, I missed it. Got a Bulbasaur - I can see through the silhouette thingy that there are Squirtles in my area, though. The whole area is pretty desolate, except the canal path is one long line of hotspots and gyms, fairly close together.

Is there any way to trade Pokemon with people nearby?

 

I dont think you can trade.

You want to catch as many of hte same pokemon as you can- each time you catch one, you get 3 of that species line candies (as in, a pidgey candy works on pidgeottos and pidgeots too), and you need those candies to evolve and "level" them up.

 

I've been playing - somehow I ran into a Pidgeot in the street next to my house, so he's my powerhouse atm. Most of my neighbourhood is Rattata, Pidgey/Pidgeotto, a few spare Spearows and such, nothing too special.

I run into some odd stuff though on the way to work. Krabby and Shellder in the middle of town, Gastly at a church, Eevee at the mosque, Mr. Mime in my bedroom (eep) and a metric ton of Seel at my workplace...? (Again, not near water.)

---------- Post automerged at 19:23 ---------- Previous post was at 19:21 ----------

Also you can 'transfer' duplicates you don't care to keep and you'll get another candy in return. I get rid of most of my rattata and pidgey and such that way, to power up my based ~250 Bite/Hyperbeam Raticate and ~400 Steel Wing/Hurricane Pidgeot.

 

I said 'fuck it, might as well' and had a wander around my area. I had a trainwreck of a time.

The servers were constantly going down (I blame the beta) so most of the trip was wasted. I found barely anything probably for that reason - only a rattata and a pidgey. When the app was running, it kept crashing. Just constantly. All of this, of course, lead to a fuck tonne of reloading - as I found out, the wait time to connect is just painful.

Also, it was loud and busy: an endless stream of cyclists kept whizzing past, almost like they were trying to keep fit or something. Obnoxious. Oh, and a chav hit on me.

0/10, would not go outside again.

 

Server has been in and out for hte last few hours for me- I'll get on for maybe 5 minutes before it freezes again : /

I log in via google account, and it makes you do the 2step verification text each time if you have that enabled (regardless if the box is checked off or not). Now its telling me that "I seem to be unable to receive the text", so I can't even see the server is down message, won't let me log in at all : (