> Should the game be inherently fair?

No, but the fairness should be based on skills and engagement, not the size of your wallet.

arguing that "you should be able to get the whole experience regardless of your location" is basically arguing against the entire category of location-based entertainment products. The experience is related to your location. That is literally the product.

Obvious straw man. No one is arguing that location based games shouldn't factor in location. The claim was that success in the game shouldn't be dependent on the size of your wallet. You can have location based games that don't require you to travel internationally or even across regions in one's own country, for example.

I've never played Pokemon Go, but I played a lot of the JRPG titles from nearly 30 years ago.

What determines success in Go? Is it battles, or is it literally just collecting Pokemon?

It doesn't really have a fixed objective. It's mostly played for fun.

The idea of Pokemon was started by Satoshi Tajiri who used to like discovering and catching insects and other small creatures locally. From that developed finding Pokemon and having them fight was added to make more of a game out of it. It's now the world's highest grossing media franchise with $88bn revenue according to Wikipedia, way ahead of that Marvel and Harry Potter nonsense. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_highest-grossing_media...)

It's a bit up to players if they want to casually collect, or fight or compete or whatever. In Pokemon Go at any rate.

I thought the whole point of geolocation games was that they are traveling games. Games for people who travel a lot. That doesn’t mean you should like them but that IS the mechanic, going around to see places. Wallet use is a part of traveling and that will continue to be true with or without pokemon go.

> I thought the whole point of geolocation games was that they are traveling games. Games for people who travel a lot.

Niantic talk about physical activity and community. Their business model is in app purchases and local advertising. Mechanics encourage controlling local territory.

> skills and engagement

Which, for a lot of cases (not universally, of course), is a function of your wallet's size anyway. Depending on your income and/or net worth, you can afford to spend a lot of your time on those, or not so much.

Why should it be that way?

Because success in life is mostly based on the size of your wallet, and games are supposed to be an escape from life. It sucks when that albatross follows you into your fantasy life.

There are plenty of other games, I don't see why there couldn't be one about traveling in the real world.

Would you frown upon Geocaching as well?

I suppose it is subjective, but it seems to be a pretty much near-universal sentiment among gamers I know that "pay to win" sucks.

A better question is why should it be pay to win?

Pokemon was never like this though. It was always unfair, because you always had to buy two different games (red+blue, gold+silver, etc) to win either of them.

It depends on how the game is setup. If it's "almost possible" to get them all, then it kind of feels like you have to get them all, even if that involves some serious work. This can be compounded if certain "best of breed" types can only be obtained in certain areas, or at certain times.

However, if it's setup so that it's basically impossible to get them all, but you can get many or any, then it doesn't feel as bad, especially if trading is an actual option that works. If the special and/or limited ones are more cosmetic, it becomes less of a chore and more of a "look what I have".

It feels like you have to get them all? why?

One of the key draws for many Pokémon players is right in the old slogan - "Gotta catch 'em all!"

Part of the desire is the collectability. To be able to get a rare, prized Pokémon. In the original games, part of this was centered around there being two editions of a game, with some of them only in the other, with the desire to make trading a social activity. That said, it certainly didn't stop people from buying two Gameboys, two copies of Pokemon, and collecting them all on their own.

Some folks just have a compulsion to have everything.

It's hard to explain, but if a game has some set of things, and you get 90% of the way there, it can feel quite like you should/need to get them all.

But if you know for a fact that there's some you can never get (had to be on the moon in 2005 to get it), then the pressure is off.

It’s a personal decision. There are so many Pokémon that hacking is a long and tedious process. You might as well download saves but them you’re not playing the game. I think it’s fun catching real Pokémon fairly but don’t mind if people hack.

> Should the game be inherently fair? ... Maybe it'll take a long time!

I don't think "maybe it'll take a long time!" is an apt response to "the game is unfair". The parent isn't objecting that it's unfair because it might take a long time, they're objecting that it's unfair because many people can't afford to travel the world. Maybe a better response would be:

> Should the game be inherently fair? ... Maybe it should take tens of thousands of dollars!

While I don't find that compelling, it at least seems more logical IMHO.