Young people head to Orange parks in droves

They could be in your house and you don’t know they are there.

They could be in your bedroom watching you sleep.

They could even be in your bed.

The PokemonGo craze has well and truly hit Orange’s young people with reports of 50 to 100 of them appearing in Robertson Park last Saturday night, July 9.

With their eyes downcast onto their phones, stumbling around looking for the little monsters that can only be seen through the lens of a smart phone camera.

PokemonGo is a smart phone app that superimposes little monsters into real-world situations and the aim is to “catch em’ all”.

Pokemon trainers, as players are known, then train their little beasties and battle them against other trainers.
Trainers have to go to virtual ‘gyms’ to train and battle their critters and as it turns out, the Orange Regional Museum courtyard is one of those gyms.

Roberston Park, Lake Canobolas and Cook Park are known as Pokestops where trainers can find medicines and food for their Pokemon and often find free-ranging Pokemon to catch.

By most accounts it seems to be a craze worth embracing, with young people getting outside, using Orange’s parks and gardens and making friends while they're playing a video game.

There will always be the odd grumble of “back in my day young people had to walk 879,000 miles to and from work, we didn’t have time for socialising” or “surely young people have better things to do than to go outside, get some fresh air and meet people”.

So if you see an army of young people walking in your direction with their eyes glued to their phone screen, don’t be alarmed, you’re probably just surrounded by invisible monsters.

CULTURED: Rattata snuck into the Orange Civic Theatre to see the renown The Wharf Revue on Tuesday night.