Video: Pokemon Go on HoloLens is the only Pokemon I’d ever want to play

I might be the only one who doesn’t care about Pokemon, and there’s good reason for that. But if it were available in VR, AR or ‘mixed reality’ (MR) — that could change.

Hololens is still in its ‘what can we really do with this thing?’ stage, but someone has already put Pokemon Go on it, showing that the world is obsessed with those cute, imaginary CGI beings.

David Robustelli is the ‘Head of Digital’ for Capitola VR, a virtual reality development studio based in Amsterdam. It creates both 360-degree videos and full VR environments, and has about 20 engineers working on various projects.

We created a full immersive @Pokemon Go version for the @HoloLens #PokemonGO #HoloLens #wannaplay #MixedReality pic.twitter.com/CrDgiF2Y6N

— David Robustelli (@RobustelliDavid) July 14, 2016

The Pokemon Go MR concept uses gestures to help you catch ‘em all, which saves you from flittering at your phone’s screen all day. Characters are also interactive with your environment; in the video above, you can see Charizard sitting on a table instead of just appearing as an overlay, Pokeballs rolling off of tables and characters climbing up someone’s leg.

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And as is the basic functionality of HoloLens, a simple tap of the finger creates an action — in this case, tossing a Pokeball.

The game appears very basic; it’s a lot of Unity 3D, generic sprites and boilerplate HoloLens use-case gamification. But damn, it’s cool.

The natural elephant in the room here is the medium. HoloLens is still in its infancy, and shouldn’t be relied upon as a standalone unit just yet. Pokemon Go isn’t available outside of mobile, either.

Still, I’d rather play Pokemon Go in mixed reality if I were ever going to play it. But, like HoloLens itself, I’m not holding my breath. Both are on the distant horizon for all of us.