I spoke about most of my personal feelings about Pokemon in an entry earlier this month, but today is officially Pokemon Day! 20 years ago today, Pokemon first came out in Japan and started it all.
Despite some issues last week, we decided to brave the cold again and head even earlier for Nintendo NYC’s Pokemon Day celebration. One of the things that helped though, besides being a bit warmer today, is they actually handed out Pikachu Hats! It helped keep the line hyped up:
(It also had the link to the Pokemon 20th Anniversary Site and #Pokemon20 below the logo… though, you can’t see that since I was wearing it :P)
Also while on line, several people were doing some really lovely chalk art:
It was fun to see them getting drawn too.
As for the actual event, things were still a bit slow–the wristband process went fairly slow and we got in about 30 minutes or so later. Lines were also crazy and as for 20th Anniversary merchandise, besides the special Mew Card Box, the only things were what they showed on their Facebook–the shirt, Champion Red, and the New 3DS. The Master Sword at the entrance was also changed to this adorable Pikachu display:
The main issue though was when they were setting up for the event–it ran a bit late and so there were tons of people waiting on the first floor (much more than there should have been) as everyone on the second floor was told to go downstairs (I feel bad for those who were on line and about to pay). It was so crowded and the first floor really shouldn’t have gotten that bad. They set up a table and some banners for where people could play TCG cards and another table for some freebies.
If you bought something, you were entered into a raffle for some random Pokemon stuff and also received a poster of the first 151 Pokemon & a timeline of the games–the same poster being given out at Toys R Us. If you went to the event, you got a Mew code and the legendary poster being given out at Gamestop.
They did 8 questions of trivia and a few rounds of Who’s that Pokemon, but with so many people very few really got to participate. I especially had a hard time with Who’s that Pokemon as I couldn’t see the screen due to being so much shorter than most of the people there. If I got into a position where I COULD see the screen, I couldn’t be seen raising my hand so that was a bit disappointing.
Besides that, you could see Pikachu for the small time he was around. With so many people in the area, the Pikachu line was already full before Pikachu even came out to see everyone. Similarly, they set up a photo op downstairs where you had Red, Blue, and Yellow games shown behind you with their respective Pokemon in front, but they finished setting it up shortly before the first Event time slot started and when it ended (it still ended on time despite us going up late due to all the set up), we had to go right out due to the large crowd waiting to go up for the second time slot so we didn’t get to do that either. They were playing music from the original Pokemon soundtracks though that came out for the Anime which I loved and made it enjoyable, even if I wasn’t able to participate in most of the event itself despite being in the first time slot.
It was definitely better than the Reopening event at least, but I still think more order is needed. And I miss the 3DS round table because after all that standing, sitting would be nice :( What I really wish they did though is:
-A big activity sheet for each person per event slot.
-Have various Pokemon hidden around the store that you needed to find similar to the skulltulas in the past.
-Rather than having so many people confined to one area of the store (And on top of just being upstairs, most of the event was just on one side. It made it easy to browse the Pokemon, Zelda, and other goods, but the area with the giant TV was so packed and the museum area only lightened up a bit after Pikachu), the entire store should have been just for the specific hour people. The store was already available from 9AM to 11AM for everyone–giving a few hours just for the event people would have not only given everyone much more breathing room, but have prevented a fire hazard with just how many people were gathered at small spaces at a time.
I just feel there really should have been more to do. An hour spent on a few Trivia questions & “Who’s that Pokemon” that not everyone could try is kind of depressing. And wouldn’t it be cool if everyone got a Pokemon Trivia Quiz to fill out? Maybe just to me, but I just think a lot more could’ve been done. I think another thing that could’ve been fun (though, I totally get that it could have been hard to do/is a bit much) is have set it up to see people at the other Pokemon Day Events around the world (or at least the US) and say Hi–just for like a super big celebration. That’s definitely going a bit further than what was really needed for an event (I would have been happy with just a lot of fun activities, but yeah). I also will just mention a lot of people were expecting Pokeball Cupcakes or Cookies (I would guess due to the Pokemon account’s posts with the Chef Pikachu Plush), but there was no food at the event.
I would have loved to check out Toys R Us’ and Gamestop’s events too, but after the Nintendo Store, I was wiped. Regardless, even if you can’t make it out somewhere, you can still celebrate Pokemon Day! Pokemon has been doing a fun stream celebrating since 1PM EST and at the time of writing this, they have just finished up with Pokemon Snap–one of my favorite Pokemon games and one I desperately wish would get a sequel. I would love to actually own Pokemon Snap sticker machine from Blockbuster. If I ever come into money, that is one of my first purchases :P
Not to mention Pokemon’s Twitter is giving you an opportunity to catch some Pokemon by using the #GottaCatchEmAll hashtag. I’ve already gotten a Psyduck and a Piplup! I hope I can catch more before the day ends. This has probably been my favorite Pokemon Day activity so far and I want to give a big “Thank you” to whoever is taking care of all those replies.
But yes, Happy Pokemon Day everyone! I hope you have fun today <3