The Pandemic Is So Bad In Japan That A Special Edition 'Pokémon GO' Pikachu Has Been Delayed

And nothing of value was lost.

Hope the developers are staying safe through all this. Sucks Covid is spiking again, though with all the morons over here in UK after the football.. our spike was inevitable.

But how will the tourists be able to enjoy their time in Okinawa, if there's no rare special limited edition pikachus to chatch?

@The_New_Butler Too many idiots won't follow basic rules to protect themselves.

@XenoShaun To be fair it was already on the rise, its because the Delta variant is ridiculously contagious.

Pretty glad I was able to get my 2nd Vaccine last Saturday.

@Dr_Lugae Congrats. I am on the list to be getting mine soon.

@XenoShaun Thanks, hopefully you don't have to wait too long.

Mine was surprisingly quick with only a 6 week gap between jabs.

I still remember when people were praising Japan for handling covid so well....

I regularly watch the baseball over in Japan, stadium must be over 70% capacity.

@Sjmaster Too many idiots are still in denial and they are the who we should blame for the rise in this Covid crap. This stuff should've never happened in the first place.

"So bad". Riiight. Tell me again which country lost more than 600k people despite being the self-proclaimed greatest nation on Earth?

@KiryuJ They did. Far far far better than most of the world.

@The_New_Butler I’m on the front lines too, and it’s fascinating to see some of my co-workers do their jobs and duties BUT STILL THINK COVID IS FAKE. Like c’mon guys, wth

"The Japanese tourism trap Okinawa?" 😂

Never heard Okinawa described that way before. Did you have a somewhat disappointing vacation there @Damo ?

I will always wear a mask. People who do not follow rules are stupid. We will never get rid of covid.until people follow the rules. The vaccine is not a cure.i have a feeling more games are going to get delayed. Metroid prime 4. Bayonetta 3. Wonder why we here nothing on them.covid maybe the reason.i except more game delays to come.

@The_New_Butler First responder, that’s all I can really divulge. But yeah, the amount of denial, especially from my co-workers, is unnerving.

Bloody hell… at first glance that article title is horrendously heartless and shows poor taste. The pandemic is SO BAD that a made up character in a video game got delayed?

This really isn’t important when people are literally suffering (I don’t know if people are still dying in Japan- but still, c’mon… who cares in the grand scheme of things?).

Surely a more appropriate title would be ‘Pokemon GO Pikachu release delayed as pandemic hits developer Niantic’. ?

@Fifth313ment
It may be time to adjust your tinfoil hat.

"The Pandemic is So Bad In Japan" ? Its bad everywhere unless your from New Zealand or Australia

@Fifth313ment So we're just gonna ignore the thousands still living with long term affects? I mean, dying from it is a serious concern. But it wasn't/isn't the only cause for concern

For the record, it's this lack of seriousness or empathy for the safety of others, amongst many other reasons, why I will continue to wear a mask even being fully vaccinated.

@Fifth313ment Well, yeah, I'm not in the risk group, but my relatives are. Even if I don't die, It would feel terrible if I end up infecting my parents and something happens to them. If you have the chance, get vaccinated. Not for yourself, but for the people you care about.

You know what I love about japan? They take things seriously. Here's some fun stats: (Note, this is from the perspective of an american)

Japan has a population that's about 1/3 of the US population. Size-wise, japan is about the size of the state of California. However, due to the presence of mountains the amount of liveable space is around the size of Rhode island. In other words, japanese people live like sardines.

Why do I bring these numbers up? Well, covid arrived in Japan around January or February of 2020, and yet they didn't have a state of emergency until January of 2021... with 7000 daily cases.... for reference, America hasn't had under 7000 daily cases since March of 2020, at its worse American cases were around a quarter mill.

I love that japan is willing to shut things down and do what is right for the sake of its people and those visiting for the Olympics, even when they see a marginal increase in covid cases. Admittedly, I'm half japanese so I do take pride in things like this, but any time I hear some idiot here in the states argue that masks and other preventative measures don't work, I look at a country like japan and wish I lived in a more rational society.

@Heavyarms55 It's a terrible headline. For a UK site, they bend over backwards to never say anything negative towards 'Murica.

@Chowdaire Even though I'm Canadian, I have a lot of admiration for Japan, including their mentality of making small personal sacrifices to aid the greater good, and I really miss my time living there.

@KiryuJ They did and still are handling it better than most countries. See my previous post. Japan declared a state of emergency when they hit 7000 daily cases, that's nothing compared to other countries, especially given their size.

I live in Japan, and just FYI, this article is incredibly misleading. Not that you should get your COVID news from a video game website, but the pandemic here has never been too bad, the numbers have been consistently low (compared to Europe and the Americas) and no lockdowns have been enacted. The Delta variant hasn’t arrived here yet either. The low vaccination rate is a problem, that’s for sure. Anyway, holding the olympics at closed doors is a half measure from the organizers thats responding to massive pressure from the public here to actually cancel the games permanently. Also calling Okinawa a tourist trap is pretty stupid.

@EVIL-C Me too. I first spent time there in high school studying abroad for three months then lived there for about a year post college. Good times.

@The_New_Butler You too!!

@Fifth313ment 8 children under the age of 10 have died from Covid, and that’s in a single town I lived in last year. Stop using the death of others from an unbiased illness to push agendas about government.

Japan: "...due to the alarming rise in coronavirus cases."

Brazil: Hold my beer.

@KiryuJ They did handle it very well. A quick look at the charts and you can see that.

@The_New_Butler
I was afraid of Covid at first. All I saw was that if you get it you could die, and how it was the worst virus ever. Then my sister got it and I saw that not to be the case in most people and it was just like the flu. My sister felt fine and was even working out in her room during that time. In fact the worst thing that came from it was more mental due to no human contact for her. That is how I found Covid to be overblown

Nice! You crossed the line from cultural misrepresentation (which you do all the time) to flat our propaganda! Let me fix this for you!

"Because Japan's aggressive response to COVID is accepted by both it's private citizens and corporations and is not opposed by a bunch of idiots who think being asked to not spread a deadly virus is a volition of their rights or uneducated morons who reject science, the response to the current state of emergency has seen wide support"

See when you said "COVID is so bad" you're saying that Japan's spread of infections is so bad it's causing things like this. That's completely inaccurate to the point of making flat earthers look good; Yesterday, the UK (Pop. 66m) saw 33,000 new cases while Japan (Pop. 150m) saw 4000 new cases. Despite having half the population of the Japan, the UK has seen TEN TIMES as many people die.

You might also want to note that at no time, even now, as there been a MANDATE to ware a mask, shelter in place, or close most businesses. It is optionable. However, due to the higher sense of social responsibility in Japan and a corporate culture that sees making a little extra money by killing your staff and customers as BAD, the uptake has been universal and effective. It helps that their is no taboo against mask wearing (or the initialization of things that help you not die in general ... remember when the GOP ran ads saying wearing a seatbelt was unamerican? Good times!) and sick people wearing them before COVID (again, that social responsibly that says "maybe I should help others to not die or become ill").

You wrote an article highlighting an example of WHY the COVID pandemic has been so small and somehow framed it as only happening because the COVID outbreak was so big. Cause and effect in the wrong order using facts that are the exact opposite of reality. That's like ... literally as wrong as you can be, isn't it?

Look I haven't done game reporting for almost 20 years now since I went all in on the academic life, but still ... my CV is pretty respectable, and I might be available for freelance work if you want someone who will do research and attempt to understand context to write sensitive article for you?

Oh wait ... inaccurate click bate is DELIBRATE, isn't it?

@SugaCyan In the interests of accuracy, it worth noting that 178 cases of the Delta variant were identified in Tokyo on Tuesday, so it is here, though it’s yet to gain the same stranglehold as seen in some other countries. Yet.

I still agree it’s a very silly headline. Using ‘measures taken against the virus’ as a metric of ‘how bad’ the situation is rather than going to the data itself is not a logical approach.

The virus is ‘so bad’ in Japan that Niantic is forced to cancel a special Okinawan Pikachu event. Meanwhile in the UK, Wembley crams over 60,000 fans into its stadium for UEFA finals while the British Prime Minister hails the imminent arrival of ‘freedom day’.

Taken in isolation, we might assume that Japan is significantly more overrun with the virus than its island nation counterpart in Europe. And it’s true that cases are back in the rise in Japan, now regularly exceeding 2000 per day. But in the UK things have now risen into the tens of thousands, with the most recent result at over 36,000. In a country with a almost half the population.

I’m not trying to blindly defend Japan. Its vaccine rollout was incredibly slow off the marks, mired as much by sluggish bureaucracy as any extra caution, and despite things now rolling along at a decent pace, the effects of that late start are still felt. Less than a fifth of the population has been vaccinated going into the largest sporting event in the world, which is not ideal.

However, I do feel we should keep a level head, and one eye on the statistics when writing articles about ‘how bad’ things are, so as not to get confused between ‘situation’ and ‘response’.

…Less importantly, I actually think calling Okinawa a ’tourist trap’ is perfectly valid. For Japanese tourists, it’s the second most popular destination in the country (after Hokkaido), and seems to do a fairly good job of capitalising on that status.

@maxz thanks for the correction! As I said this isn’t the best place for COVID news

@HeadPirate Some (very minor) fact checking. Let me know if you have any sources that differ.

Population of Japan: Roughly 126 million

Yesterday’s recorded cases (Tuesday 13th July 2021): 2386

I say this in the interest of accuracy rather than argument, as they’re fairly minor adjustments and don’t really change any general lines of reasoning.

Yes, the pandemic is "so bad" in Japan they have 2000 cases a day. A little perspective, please! The larger European countries were getting 60,000 a day, and that's with less population and less density than Japan. I'd say cancelling such events is why Japan's daily case count is actually so good.

absurdly large eye roll

@BloodNinja yeah, show me that story (and it would be a story because it's completely out of the norm. From the CDC stays, "The data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows that children account for about 7.3% of cases. Children account for less than 1% of deaths." So I'm sorry I don't believe you, unless the kids were in a hospital or hospital type setting with serious comorbidities.

I'm sorry just because of a pandemic the constitution isn't paused! This is extremely important and judges have already ruled on this saying as much. I agree with most of you and I'm vaccinated. I wore my mask until I was double vaxxed. If you want to wear a mask and wash your hands, etc you have every right to do that but YOU DON'T have the right to force another American to do it. Also businesses have the right to say who does have to wear a mask in their store or not, again NOT THE GOVERNMENT!

And if you don't think this hasn't been a big power grab just look at many places who still have crazy lockdown rules in place. It's funny that red states who let up restrictions and go back to normal faster actually did much better than places that stayed locked down way after. No tin foil hat needed!

@The_New_Butler "But as long as you are OK then why should you have to do what you are told?"

I live in America so I don't have to do what I'm told, by anyone! No one has the right to tell me what to do clinical fascist.

@Fifth313ment I'm good man, you can look it up on your own. I don't think the government was doing a power grab any different than any other year. They are always trying to expand their power in different ways. If you are still voting for colors (blue or red) you aren't exactly helping the problem, either.

@The_New_Butler you apparently need a lesson on the American system of government. You are NOT told to do anything in the US. I can do anything as long as my freedom doesn't interfere with someone else's freedom. You're not told to do your taxes as you can choose not to work. You are using murder as an example, lol? You apparently don't know what fascist means. "a political philosophy, movement, or regime (such as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition." Forcible suppression of opposition, if I don't want to wear or mask or shut down my business and you make me, often at gunpoint. And the first part of that definition a regime that puts nation (or the group) above the individual and headed by a "dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation". Does this not sound like what happened during the pandemic. A dictator (faucci) told us what we were and were not going to be able to do. And if you didn't you had economic and social punishments. They fine you and others in stores would attack you and CA you names. I'm not saying it is fascist but it's very close, much more so than anything Trump ever did and everyone called him a fascist. Last time I checked in fascist governments when you say something against the leader you and your family are black bagged. But maybe we just haven't tried the right kind of fascism or socialism. Lol