Esri Mapping Technology Helps in Catching Pokémon
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Esri Mapping Technology Helps in Catching Pokémon

Pokémon Go is taking over the world and there is no escape. People are hunting Pokémon on the streets, in parks, in buildings and in some very unlikely and even ridiculous places. With its ArcGIS mapping platform, Esri is helping players of the game to find Pokémon in their vicinity.

Pokémon Go is a location-based, augmented reality game developed for iOS and Android devices. In the game, players use their smartphone’s GPS and camera to capture, battle and train virtual creatures, called Pokémon, who appear on the screen as if in the same real-world location as the player.

When seeking these virtual creatures, users can gain extra support from the PokéVision app that runs on Esri ArcGIS.

Location

How does it work? PokéVision, a web map powered by ArcGIS services, shows all Pokémon near user-requested locations. When visitors type an address or drop a pin on the map, Pokémon are displayed in real-time. PokéVision helps Pokémon Go players hunt more strategically by displaying location changes and time spent in each place; the length of time in a given location depends on the rarity of the character.

When PokéVision was created, the developers chose Esri ArcGIS almost immediately because it was the only option that was able to scale at the necessary rate of growth, explained PokéVision founder Y. Liu. Using Esri alleviated many of the concerns with scaling, and helped to quickly and seamlessly keep pace with the growing user base.

Interactive Mapping Capabilities

PokéVision developers chose Esri for its open-source, mobile-friendly interactive mapping capabilities. The developers first built the locator for a few friends, but the tool was so popular it quickly went viral. Within hours of creation, Esri experienced double the normal hit rates, and use of interactive maps used to display Pokémon rose by more than 30%.

The ArcGIS Online platform is designed to scale in high-performance, high-growth environments, said Paul Ross, product manager for ArcGIS Online at Esri. Even large datasets at high volume can be handled in real or near-real-time, as happened with the PokéVision locator.

Developers can bring the PokéVision location to their apps using ArcGIS regardless of their experience in creating geospatial applications. Web, mobile and desktop apps can incorporate the same mapping, visualisation and analysis that hundreds of thousands of organisations around the world rely on every day.

Image courtesy: Yoshikazu Takada/Flickr.

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