It’s finally here – the game that’s been the root of much intrigue since the announcement in September of last year. Prior to today (or yesterday’s launch, if you’re in Austrailia or Japan), all of that intrigue was primarily held by people who loved Pokemon. Today, however, provided you’ve left the house at all, you might be curious for different reasons. Namely, why are there people shuffling around, awkwardly pointing their phones in different directions like a blind tourist trying to take pictures.

I launched Pokemon Go, and following the creation of a not-so-exact replica of myself as the trainer, I began my journey to collect em’ all.

Unfortunately it was 10:00pm so wandering around outside was not within the realm of possibilities. Literally couldn’t be worse timing for this release, as my bike’s also in the shop, and I wasn’t walking a mile at this point.

However! I turned around to see none other than a lonely Bulbasaur sitting atop my Playstation, as if to taunt me and demand answers, like “why is this a Playstation and not a WiiU?” I know Bulbasaur, I’m as frustrated about it as you are.

I caught him immediately and was stoked! But alas, this was the end of my first day. It was time for bed and not time for wandering into police stations.

Today happened to be a day that I commuted into the city for work. Let me tell you, I’d never been so excited about getting on a bus before. Seeing landmarks (representing Poke Centers and Gyms) spring up all around me was really cool. Finding a Pokemon and locating it through Augmented Reality? Incredible! I know this augmented reality stuff has existed for some time, but it’s never been this amazing. Recreating the stumbling upon of a Pokemon in real life has been something any fan would have surgically removed limbs to experience, and now here we are.

I caught 3 Pokemon (Eevee, Clefairy, and Weedle) on the 3 block walk to my office, one of whom was sitting atop a food cart, which yielded all sorts of strange looks, until I saw 10 feet away that someone else was doing the exact same thing. I ended up being 20 minutes late for work and completely missing a meeting. but it didn’t matter – I caught some Pokemon.

I’ll definitely be playing this one a bunch – I had a great time with it messing around a little today. Nintendo does seem to be have some big problems with their authentication servers, however. Frequent app crashes have been a thorn in players’ sides, but I’m hopeful we’ll see an immediately patch that addresses app instability and login issues.

If I currently have one complaint about Pokemon Go, it’s that the GPS does not work terribly well. It likes to spin around, semi-aimlessly. I still see Pokemon appear, I can still visit Centers, and it seems to work for the most part. But it can’t seem to orient itself correctly, and moving about while looking at the phone proves to be a great way to walk into traffic. I’m going to try to avoid that, though. Send help if I don’t post again within the week.