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ERIC Number: EJ1284128
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2020
Pages: 33
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-1938-0399
EISSN: N/A
Japanese Seasonal Play: A Prehistory of "Poke´mon GO"
Davies, Hugh
American Journal of Play, v12 n3 p305-337 Spr 2020
The popularity of "Pokémon GO" has been credited to its branding by the Japanese multinational consumer electronics and video game company Nintendo, the technological innovations of the game's developer Niantic, and the historical traditions of European avant-garde locative play. The author, instead, offers a different explanation that involves a radical new take on "Poke´mon GO," pointing to its ancestry in the seasonal play of Japan. Based on his fieldwork during residencies at Studio Kura in Itoshima, Japan, and through Asialink at Tokyo Art and Space, he explores the Japanese roots of the game in insect collecting, shrine pilgrimage, leisure tourism, and stamp rallies as modes of play. He relocates the genealogy of "Poke´mon GO" and invokes the largely untold history of Japanese seasonal play, both of which hold significant implications for the ways we consider and conceptualize pervasive and location-based games globally.
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: Japan
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A