The wait is over for ‘Pokemon Go’ fans in Japan

It was announced Thursday, July 21, 2016, that McDonald’s is the first company to partner with the wildly popular smartphone game “Pokemon Go”.

In “Pokemon Go”, launched this month, players search for digital creatures that pop up on smartphone screens as they move through real-world locations. The game’s popularity has led shares of Nintendo to almost double this month, making it the best-performing stock on the MSCI World Index.

The game has enthralled players and boosted investors’ view of Nintendo’s future, as they bet the group can cash in on a treasure chest of other lucrative cartoon characters, from Donkey Kong to Super Mario.

From the game industry (perspective), the critical point here is that this game is making money from in-app purchases.

“This game is just as I imagined it to be, it’s really fun”, said Toshinori Ishibashi, 18, who was seen playing the game near a Pokemon goods store in Tokyo Station. He was hoping to test his skills in a battle at a McDonald’s, but realized he had not reached a sufficient level to do so.

Other Pokemon Go users didn’t have to look far, with 21-year-old fan Tomoharu Kudo finding a Charmander in his bed. He downloaded the game as soon as a school exam ended Friday morning.

As anticipation built toward the Japan release earlier this week, the government issued nine safety-related rules for “Pokemon Go” players to follow. Niantic CEO John Hanke asked users to play with care.

Pokemon Go is an augmented reality game on smartphones which already has millions of people worldwide obsessively capture small creatures in public spaces. The country’s National Center for Incident Readiness and Strategy for Cybersecurity (NISC) told users of the mobile game not to use their real names and warned them about the risks of heat stroke in the muggy Japanese summer.