Tracking Down Pokemon GO Characters Around Duke's Campus

Pikachu and friends have arrived, and they are turning the Duke campus into a Pokémon GO playground. That means more fun for people walking through the Sarah P. Duke Gardens, the Duke Lemur Center or the Abele Quad. 

But it also means game players need to be safe and considerate of others as they chase down the 151 virtual game characters.

To take a step back, Pokémon GO is an augmented reality game played on smartphones or tablets, and in the first week since its release, it’s become one of the most talked about apps. Some 7.5 million people in the US have downloaded the game, putting it on around 5 percent of all smartphones in the country. 

Unlike other app games, it is meant to be played outdoors and get people moving around.  The app uses the smartphone’s camera to guide the player toward PokéStops – real places, such as the Gardens, where characters have been virtually placed. Capture enough Pokémon characters and you can go to a “Gym,” sites where you can do battle with other game players.

For the most part, it’s all in good fun, and Duke has used the game to reach out to prospective students and others in the Duke community. This week, as the mania around the game started to grow, Duke's social media team went to the Duke Lemur Center and did a hunt for Pokémon characters with the lemurs.

At Undergraduate Admissions, staff placed a lure to allow visitors to search for characters there while visiting the office.  Admissions also sent an email to all of our admissions visitors signed up this summer with the lemur photos, enticing them to visit the Lemur Center and all of the campus PokéStops.

There are a handful of Gyms on campus and dozens of PokéStops. The number of game players is likely to significantly increase when students return in August. 

As the game’s popularity took off, so did stories about injuries to gameplayers focusing too much attention on their game app, as well as concerns about the appropriateness of some of the PokéStops. Duke officials are asking gameplayers to use caution and common sense.

“Obviously like millions of people across the globe, the Pokémon GO release has had some early adopters here in Durham at Duke,” said Kyle Cavanaugh, vice president for administration. “Similar to other mobile use applications, we have been advising users to use caution when moving about, and to consider playing with teams and during more traditional day light hours.”

Below, a map of PokéStops and Pokémon Gym locations scattered across Duke's campus.