Pokemon Go, the virtual reality game where players have to ‘catch’ and ‘train’ creatures called Pokemons, has officially been launched in India, months after it first became available in markets such as the US.
The India launch has been done in association with Reliance Jio, the 4g mobile operator from the Mukesh Ambani group.
“With this partnership, thousands of Reliance Digital Stores and select partner premises in India will appear as ‘PokéStops’ or ‘Gyms’ in the Pokémon GO game beginning Wednesday, December 14, 2016,” said Jio in a statement.
Under the partnership, Jio’s retail locations and charging stations will be activated as PokéStops and Gyms within the game, and allowing users “to catch, train, and battle” at any of Jio’s outlets throughout the country.
“With over 500 million downloads globally, we are excited to launch Pokémon GO officially in India on the Reliance Jio network,” said Mathew Oommen, President Reliance Jio.
Pokémon Go is a free-to-play, location-based augmented reality game developed by Niantic and is the result of a collaboration between Niantic and The Pokémon Company. It was initially released in selected countries in July 2016.
In the game, players use a mobile device’s GPS capability to locate, capture, battle, and train virtual creatures, called Pokémon, who appear on the screen as if they were in the same real-world location as the player. The game supports in-app purchases for additional in-game items.
The game has become the fastest game to top the App Store and Google Play and became the most downloaded app on the App Store of any app in their first week.
Within two days of release, it was installed on more than 5% of Android devices in the United States. The reason for delayed launch in markets like India has to do with high load on servers of the company.