iStock/Thinkstock(SAN FRANCISCO) — The wildly popular mobile app taking the country by storm amassed thousands of “Pokemon Go” players in San Francisco on Wednesday.
“Pokemon Go” is an augmented reality treasure hunt in which players walk around in real life to capture virtual characters as they pop up on their smartphone screens.
What started as a Facebook event for friends turned into the biggest Pokemon event yet. Thousands gathered at the Embarcadero and Dolores Park with the goal of catching as many Pokemon as possible while socializing during the seven-hour event that spanned 3.5 miles.
"When I say Pokemon you say Go!" #POKECRAWLSF pic.twitter.com/7SdV8AORvu
— Alexandra Mosher (@MosherNews) July 21, 2016
The Golden City transformed into a gold mine for hunting Pokemon.
“I don’t see why you wouldn’t be playing it,” Scott Olofsen told ABC News.
With so many players involved in the event, servers struggled to meet demands. Persistent crashes on the app left many players frozen with an error message for hours.
Hackers took credit for the server crash on social media.
Frustrated players who experienced frozen screens rejoiced once the game was back in action.
The app has proven to be extremely distracting for some players.
A Baltimore police body camera caught a distracted “Pokemon Go” driver crashing into a parked police patrol car early Monday morning. An officer followed the driver, who eventually stopped to show the game on his cellphone.
“That’s what I get for playing this dumb [a–] game,” the driver told the officer, in the nearly 90 second video.
No injuries were reported. The driver wasn’t identified in the video and police did not say if he was facing any charges.
With rising safety concerns around the game, police in San Francisco made sure to have extra patrols out to keep players away from harm during the event on Wednesday.
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