 Pokemon Go is a cultural moment. It's one of the biggest Pokemon video games of all time and it's available on iOS and Android. If you're just starting, I have some beginner's tips for you. And if you're really obsessed with the game already, I've got the advanced tips to be the very best. And I'll help you conquer the gyms. So, let's go. Kachama! If you're just starting on Pokemon, here are some tips for you. First, you'll have three Pokemon to choose from at the very beginning. Squirtle, Charmander, and Bulbasaur, who is the best. But if you really want to pick Pikachu, you can. Simply walk away from your three options four times. On the fourth time, Pikachu will appear, you'll toss a Pokeball at it, and you'll have it in your collection. How do you toss a Pokeball, you might ask? Well, it's quite simple. Put your finger on the ball, flick it forward. There are more advanced techniques. We'll get to those later. Every time you catch a Pokemon, you'll get Stardust and you'll get Candies. Candies are specific to the type of Pokemon you have. So, if you catch a whole bunch of Zubats, you're going to have a whole bunch of Zubat Candies. And when you have enough, you can spend those and some Stardust to evolve the Zubat into a new creature. In this case, a Golbat. While you're on your path, walking about, you're going to see little blue posts. Those are Poké Stops. And whenever you visit one, you can collect free items by spinning the little token nearby. These refresh every five minutes, so if there aren't a lot in your neighborhood, you can double back after a while and collect more stuff. We'll get into what those items do later. But for now, make sure that every time you visit, you're collecting free things. Now, as you're playing, you might find that the screen freezes or it doesn't connect to the internet. There are a number of bugs in this game. It's still relatively new, but we expect a lot of those to get fixed in the coming weeks. So, make sure to keep the game updated regularly. Okay, these are the final and most important tips for a Pokémon Go beginner. First, get a battery pack if you can afford it. It will be a huge help. You don't want to be out in the middle of nowhere searching for a Snorlax, only for your battery to die and you not know how to get home. Even if you have the battery pack, conserve your battery. If your phone has the option, go into settings and select a power saving mode, but only if it doesn't affect your GPS. And inside the Pokémon app, you can select another power saving mode from settings. When you choose it, you'll have the normal phone screen, but if you flip it upside down, it dims the game, saving a little bit of power. It'll buzz your phone if a Pokémon is nearby. Lastly, and here's where I don't know if I would encourage this, but maybe you're becoming a bit more of a hardcore gamer. You can turn off the AR mode, not seeing the Pokémon in the world around you, but seeing it inside of a video game. It's joyless and I don't know anybody who would want to do it, except for maybe my friend, Ross. Alright, at this point you've committed yourself to Pokémon. You've maybe drained your battery once or twice, maybe you've hit level 5 and decided to pick a team. But you started to question things, like what do footprints actually mean? And what are the ethical implications of domesticating aggressive animals by cramming them into a tiny ball? Then you realize you don't really care about these emotional trivialities, because for you, Pokémon has become a numbers game. And to be the very best, the very best, you're going to have to get those numbers as high as possible. So when you're catching Pokémon, you probably notice the ever-shrinking colored ring. It's green when you start out, but later on you'll start seeing yellows, oranges, other shades of red. And what that means is those Pokémon are both powerful, more powerful, and also harder to catch. Now, later on you'll get things like great balls and ultra balls, which will make it easier to catch them. But there's also these things called Razzberries, and once you hit level 8, you'll start seeing these pop up as items. Use the Razzberry, feed the Pokémon, it'll start liking you, and that's when you get it. Now as long as you toss the Poké Ball into the outer ring, you're still going to have a chance of catching the Pokémon. But, there's a method to the shrinking ring's madness, and that's where we're going to get extra points. Landing the ball within the smaller ring gives you some bonus experience points. If you get a fuller ring, it's a nice for 10 points. A half ring gives you a great for 50 points. And if you can realize your dream of becoming an inhuman Pokémon catching machine, an excellent in the small ring will net you 100 extra bonus points. And for another 10 experience points, you can spin the ball ahead of time and give it a nice little curve. It is an acquired skill. And remember, it's a lot easier to get a nice every time, so sometimes a Pidgey in the hand is worth more than a lot of missing Poké Balls. Also, turn off AR mode. Look, if you have it on, obviously you can make a lot of memes, but the internet has made literally every funny joke about Pokémon already. You're not going to add to this. All you care about is the points. Get those points, turn off AR mode, might even save a little bit of battery, and that's extra Pokémons in the long run. Okay, so now it's time to talk about catching Pokémon. And I mean catching as many Pokémon as you can as fast as you can. And they're all good to get. New Pokémon get you, you know, extra experience points. And new Pokémon! The old ones, the repeats, look, you can always transfer them to a farm upstate and you'll get extra candies. And don't worry, they're going to be fine. Professor Willow promised. So let's talk about those footprints. Basically, if it's got three prints, it means it's in the general area. It means it's going to show up in your little menu. Two is closer, one is closer still, and no footprints means you should be clicking on it already. Why are you even in that menu? Now, there's no great way to tell if you're walking in the right direction, but you can play a bit of a hot and cold game. Keep that three by three grid open showing all the Pokémon in the area while you walk around, and you can figure out which is closer by the order of the Pokémon. And while you're out searching for Pokémon, do not forget to use items. They're there for a reason. There's no point to hoarding them at all. Incense will attract Pokémon to you at a much faster rate wherever you walk. And while you're doing that, might as well toss in a lucky egg. They work great together because they double the experience points of whatever you do in a set period of time as well. And again, this is about getting as many points as you can as fast as you can. But it should be clear by now that I am actually the laziest person in the world. I don't want the Pokémon to find me in the streets. I want Pokémon to find me at a bar or a coffee shop or a cocktail lounge or a bar. So this is when you actually get the lures. The lures are great because they help everyone. They're like incense. They attract Pokémon to the location, but it applies to everyone who's playing Pokémon Go. So as long as you've got a PokéStop near a bar or perhaps your office break room, you're set. I might even recommend getting friends because the friends can take turns putting down lures after you're done. So just sit back, relax, and let the Pokémon come to you. But say you want to stay a little bit more true to the original Pokémon games. Travel across the land searching far and wide. And just like when you get a bike in Cerulean City, getting a bike in Pokémon Go completely changes the game. Pedaling along leisurely will get you to PokéStops faster, help you hatch those pesky eggs, and get you to new areas to catch new Pokémon. On my way to work, I hit about 30 PokéStops, getting Pokéballs, items to heal and attract Pokémon, as well as way more eggs than I could possibly know what to deal with. Mileage may vary if you're not in New York City where the landmarks are super prevalent, but all the more reason to have a bike or skateboard because it will get you from one PokéStop to the next way quicker than walking. Since different Pokémon are in different places, it's important to get there, and a bike is the most efficient way to cover all the areas so you can get different Pokémon in different places. So if I'm out of Sandshrew when I'm on my way here, or in my apartment, all I can get are Zubats because I don't know why. Now, it's important to keep it slow because if you're going too fast, those egg steps don't count anymore. So if you're in a train or a car, it's not going to do you any good. Plus, if you're going too fast, you can't hit on those PokéStops or the Pokémon very accurately. Okay, so let's talk about safety. The bike or skateboard is for getting from point A to point B. Don't play while you're riding in traffic. No Pikachu is worth your life or someone else's. So when you're playing, stay alert and use common sense. And definitely do not drive and play this game. So you just hit level 5 and you're ready to start taking on the Gyms. You can find Gyms at major landmarks and areas of interest. It's helpful to look at the Gyms near you and see which factions control them because you can battle for control of Gyms that are owned by other factions, but you can only add Pokémon to help defend Gyms that are owned by your faction. Pokémon you add to Gyms will stay there until the Gym is defeated. Since the game is fairly new, there are actually still a bunch of unclaimed Gyms. There will be gray Gyms on your map. You can conquer them by adding a Pokémon. But make sure it's a strong Pokémon because that will be the only one left to defend the Gym until somebody else adds another Pokémon. Conquering a Gym is probably the hardest part of Pokémon GO. You select six of your Pokémon to take the Gym on. Once the battle begins, you can do three things. You can tap to attack, you can swipe to dodge, or you can press and hold to do your special attack. But the special attack only works after you've filled up the blue bubble. You can even team up with other members of your factions to take down Gyms. And working together can make beating a Gym a lot easier. The Gym becomes unclaimed as soon as you beat the Gym leader, so add a Pokémon as fast as you can. Otherwise, you risk losing the unclaimed Gym to some random bystander who's just going to reap the benefits of your hard work. Now that you've finished your battle, your Pokémon are probably fainted or pretty weak, so you're going to need to use items to bring them back to health. And Potions and Revives can be found at PokéStops, or you can buy them through the app. Train your Pokémon and conquer the city. You're ready to be a Pokémon master.