A couple years back a mobile game came out, a little title called: Pokemon GO. You heard of that? Back in 2016 it was something of a killer app. It was a title that managed to amass a respectable $207 million in it's first month and accounted for 45% of play time out of the top 20 android games for its first 3 months. At its peak, Pokemon Go boasted daily worldwide player of 45 million. So it comes to the surprise of no one, that Go's masterminds: Niantic, are oh-so eager to recapture their runaway success with their next project. Which is essentially the exact same idea attached to a different brand. That's the mobile market for you.
In their defense, I would be attempting the same thing in their shoes. Pokemon GO was nothing short of a global cultural phenomena when in launched. All over the world we heard stories surrounding the crazy lengths people would go to in order to get their mitts on the virtual battle beasts. Stories of fan causing stampedes in Taipei, a Go streamer getting mugged at midnight in central park, and even one about a Russian YouTuber who got sentenced to a suspended 3 year sentence for playing the game in a church. The level of proliferation that Pokemon Go reached was unprecedented, even for a franchise known for bleeding into the mainstream more than once before. Even people who would, ideally, never cross paths with Pokemon in their entire lives ended up getting in on the action. Who remembers when Hillary Clinton chanted "Pokemon Go-to-the-polls" In the middle of her election campaign or when Donald Trump commented about how he would like to play the game but just didn't have the time. It was like the entire world went mad.
Nowadays, things have settled down and mobile app stats are being led by King's: Candy Crush Saga, once again. Balance had been restored to the universe. However, Niantic are not done yet. They want to have a second shot at capturing a bottleful of lightning. 'Harry Potter: Wizards Unite' is their next big venture, leaning off another popular young adult franchise in order to sink in it's appeal. It is a sound business move for Warner Bros too, as they are still in the middle of their 'Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them' series and have started trying to drum up interest for a potential Harry Potter TV series. It only makes sense for them to try their hand at roping in fans from the world's most profitable entertainment medium, doesn't it. But will a Harry Potter-Pokemon Go clone really strike the world by storm as much as Niantic's first outing?
CEO John Hanke seems to think so. Although, I couldn't find the interview myself, I watched Alex, from YouTube's AngryJoeShow, claim that Hanke said "Harry Potter is a bigger franchise in terms of global awareness and fan base to Pokemon". Perhaps this is why Niantic thought that this would be their next ARG mobile best seller? I do find such an assumption interesting because, even if he was just paying lip service for the interview, it remains the most insight we have into the thought process of Niantic. I, for one, have to disagree with him on this particular quote. I believe that, despite the inherent difficulty with comparing movie and book fans beside video game and TV fans, Pokemon is still by and large a much bigger franchise in just about every way. But lets take a closer look just to make sure.
The sure-fire, investor approved, method for testing franchise viability is a taking a look at how much total revenue that brand has amassed. This can be a helpful statistic in establishing how many people care enough to spend money on your products alongside how savvy your team is at wringing them dry. In this department, it seems that things are pretty much cut and dry. According to Wikipedia, Harry Potter is the third largest media franchise in the world with a total revenue of $25 billion since inception in 1997; unfortunately for Potter fans, the number one franchise in the world is still Pokemon with an eye watering, $55 billion total revenue. Pokemon easily surpasses Harry Potter in money making potential, whilst having only been around for one year more. Also neither franchise appears to be slowing down, Pokemon is in good standing in the world of gaming as has been for over 2 decades now; and as I've said before, gaming is the most lucrative form of entertainment. J.K. Rowling's series can't really compare in that department.
Now lets look at reception. I think it is safe to say that Pokemon is beloved with its fan base, new and old. How else would they be able to get away with the same cheap, two-game game, marketing ploy that they've been pushing for the last 20 years. Fans respect Pokemon and, despite some recent discontent, will continue to do so, going forward. Pokemon is just too big and integrated with such vertically that no single disappointment from one of it's releases is going to sully the larger brand. Harry Potter is different. Starting off as solely a book series before becoming solely a movie series,(There was a little period of crossover somewhere) Harry Potter has never had as many eggs in the basket as Pokemon does. Kind of impressive if you think about it in terms of how successful it has become, but provably risky. Fans have grown tired over the past few years with the comments Rowling as made as well the general milking of the franchise. So far, 'Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them' has seemed a little aimless and shaky. Heck, 30 minutes of the first movie was dedicated to chasing around CGI monsters. (Which, on a side note, where really poorly designed. Someone on Warner Bros. design department needs to give the guys who work on Monster Hunter a call.) 'Crimes of Grindlewald' really reflected the lack of audience interest when it generated a franchise low domestic take of $62.2 million on it's opening. Does this mean the Harry Potter is trending downwards. Yes, statistically. We'll have to wait and see if an in-universe TV series helps to shake things up.
Then there is the difficult to measure statistic of cultural impact. I could lay down a ton of incidental evidence on this subject, like how Harry Potter never had it own trading card game or never caused seizures throughout japan (allegedly.) But the truth is that I just don't keep enough tabs on Harry Potter news to provide an impartial prospective. What is impartial, however, are numbers. And just like Shakira's 2005 hips; they don't lie. Google trends seems to show that; as of the release of Pokemon go, 'Pokemon' has been a more popular search term than 'Harry Potter', despite 'Crimes of Grindlewald' being released in 2018. I may be a tad biased for the fuzzy electric rodent and his friends but It's hard to deny, Harry Potter does not ring with the same resonance that Pokemon does. It makes you wonder just what on earth John Hanke is talking about.
Don't misconstrue this to think that I hate Harry Potter or anything, Harry Potter was a huge part of my childhood. The only thing I've ever won, was a school competition for which the reward was a collection of the first five potter books, and since then I have been a fan of the wizarding world. However, since then I have also discovered so many other fantastic, well designed fictional worlds, and I can see just how weak Harry Potter's world building is by comparison. Don't believe me? Name one wizarding job that graduates can move onto that is neither school related or a ministry official. Quidditch star? Quidditch star announcer? Quidditch Cheerleader? Harry Potter lacks the depth to support deep dives into its lore, which is why Fantastic Beasts feels so shallow and why Niantic's 'Harry Potter: Wizards Unite' only bought in $1 million in it's opening weekend.
For me I suppose I grew out of Harry Potter after 'The Deathly Hallows'. And before the movies finished, seeing as how I still haven't seen 'The Deathly Hallows Part 2'. I approached the prequels with some interest but after the mess that was 'The Crimes of Grindlewald', I feel I've gone off that too. Pokemon is just so much easier to love and weirdly timeless. It's games are simple and fun, it's show is watchable and the card game is... hopelessly broken, but 2/3 ain't bad. Niantic are naive if they truly believe they can recapture the success of Pokemon Go; and honestly, they shouldn't even try. A lot of amazing things sprung from the days of Pokemon Go but a lot of negativity has too. Remember that mugging I mentioned, or that arrest? There are so many others. One man quit his job to 'Go' full time and another's infidelity was discovered due to the game's GPS feature. My favourite is a man who nearly lost his job when he was caught playing it and the company assumed he was selling company secrets. Whenever anything reaches that level of proliferating into the mainstream it is bound to track a lot of feces behind it. Niantic doesn't need that kind of heat coming down on them again. They're a small (Or rather were small) mobile development company who struck gold but ,for some reason, are still digging. My unsolicited advice, be happy with what you have and careful not to choke on your aspirations.
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