Lena Cillis talks Pokemon Go Events at Pokemon Go Copenhagen
I got the amazing chance to attend Pokemon Go Fest Copenhagen, which is just a fantastic celebration of Pokemon Go. These types of in-person, physical events are rare when it comes to the gaming world, especially mobile gaming. While in Copenhagen, I had the chance to speak to Lena Cillis, the marketing manager of Live Events for EMEA territories, for Niantic. She had helped set up several of the more recent Pokemon Go physical events and lifted the curtain on how things worked behind the scenes.
Pokemon Go Fest Copenhagen was Lena's fifth event, previously hosting Go Fest in Berlin, London, Madrid, Paris and now Copenhagen. I've actually been to four out of these five events, having seen the different challenges of the individual parks, features that were showcased, and changes in the game over the last few years.
"There is always a very specific city flavour to each of the Go Fests. For every new city or every new country we go to, we start working with local vendors, because we don't know the city or their city as they do. So we make sure to get local expertise on board while making sure that we get all the learnings from previous years in."
Working with locals, when it comes to all of these different locations, does make a lot of sense. One of the unique things is the way that Pokemon Go physical events, both Go Fest and Safari, is the way that they takeover the cities that they are in. In Go Fest events, there is the physical park experience that is done at a select location, with players having a specific timeslot when the parks come to life with raids, spawns, and activities outside of the game. Then, there is the City Experience that brings players together around the greater city itself. With Copenhagen, there were the added LEGO locations, based on their LEGO collaboration - all of which became a massive takeover of the greater area.
"It's hard to plan for all of the scenarios because when you get on-site, there's always something happening that you have not accounted for, something crazy, but in general, we just try to prepare for anything."
Things like weather have taken a toll on a lot of the events that I've attended, with London getting stormed on, and Paris, on the other hand, being in a heatwave. Obviously, Pokemon Go doesn't have a giant shield that can go over the parks where they set up play, but over the years, they've gotten better at being prepared.
"It is obviously a challenge, because this is an open park, it is an outdoor and open-air event. But we definitely have a lot of measures, for example, where we expect a lot of sun, we have a lot of shading in the park. For rainy cities, we have backups to make sure that if it gets muddy, we can cover things, and we can make sure that everything stays accessible all of the time."
This sort of preparing and planning, for such a large-scale and in-demand event, feels like it takes a lot of prep work. When it came to the Mewtwo Raids at the end of each timeslot at Go Fest Copenhagen, everything was very well designed. Players could see a star on the bottom of the map, which showcased what gyms were going to have the Mega raids they could take part in, and the individuals playing in the park were split between locations, so that they could not only physically be moved away from each other, but also so that they could be in better locations for connectivity. It was such a good decision and had a fantastic visual impact, while clearly making the connectivity better as well.
"There are so many factors that go into it, because on one hand, you obviously have the game design part of it, and then on the other side, you have all of the physical challenges to it. There are a lot of requirements we need to meet. When we go to a different city each year, there are obviously always different laws that we also have to adhere to. For each of the parks, it's just completely new requirements that we need to meet. From the physical setup side of things, we go in and try to model the perfect board for people to play on."
Go Fest Copenhagen had an IP tie-in with LEGO, which featured some PokeStops around the city, a LEGO tent inside the park, and Pikachus with special LEGO backgrounds, which are stunning.
"That was a very close collaboration. We've been working very, very closely for this event in particular with the Nordics Team, the Danish Team of LEGO. We were just talking about like, what we would love to do and what they would love to do. Everyone was just so passionate about this collaboration because we just think it's a perfect fit and a perfect match. It was really looking at the needs of someone who loves LEGO, but also looking into the needs of someone who loves Pokemon Go, making sure that we take the best out of all of that and combine."
Lena Cillis reflected back on her favourite city to create a Go Fest in, which turns out to be all of them.
"The thing is that when you plan these events, it takes a year, a year and a half. You spend so much time in that particular city. When we started the process for Paris, I thought, 'I don't like Paris.' I've been there before a number of times, and I thought I didn't like Paris. I think my memory just tricked me, because when we did all of these site visits, I just really fell in love with the city, to be honest. You get a whole new perspective through work - it is a very rare thing."
When it comes to planning these events as a whole, Lena Cillis has seen several opening days of Go Fests that she has been a part of.
"I think for me, it's always kind of emotional. You know, we plan for these events for one year or one year and a half, and it's always somehow abstract because you're always planning on paper. Then you come on site, and you see everything come to life that you've been planning for over a year. Then the players get to experience that. Once you see the first person walk into the park and they're smiling, and they get to experience what you've been planning for so long, that's the best thing. It's every time. Every time. They are happy, and you're like, 'Yes. That's why we do this.' It's quite a unique job where you get to see the actual player validation, whereas when you add something new to the game, no one is looking through our phones at us to see their reactions. It is such a different experience."
I look forward to seeing more of the Pokemon Go Fests and other events that are put on by Lena Cillis and the rest of her team, as they are always such a fantastic, well-created experience.
