Pokemon Go is one of hottest and most entertaining apps out right now for smart phones, letting everyone’s dream of a real life pokemon adventure come true. For all you youngsters and bug catchers, here are 5 tips for Pokemon Go that me and my friends have picked up on for you trainers in Naperville.

1.   Hold onto your candies and stardust.

This game works a whole lot differently than the handheld games, rather to evolve pokemon you need candies by catching pokemon in the respected evolution line, and to power up “raise their CP” you need stardust. On top of this, your trainer him or herself levels up too. As tempting as it is to use them, hold onto your candies and stardust until your trainer is a higher CP, probably 8 at the least, because pokemon with higher CPs will become easier to find. So saving your candies and stardust is better because then you can use them to level up high CP pokemon rather than wasting them on low ones at the start.

2.   Actually travel

This seems obvious but it is important, the more you travel, the more likely you are to encounter rare and high cp pokemon. It’s time for you to dust of that bike and running shoes, and crunch down those miles if you want rare pokemon. It’s also important to note pokemon will spawn near things that represent their type more frequently. Such as water near bodies of water and bug in fields.

3.   Don’t get to attached to your starter, it’s useless: pidgeys are where it’s at

Since in Pokemon Go you power up and evolve pokemon by catching pokemon in their evolution line, generally rare pokemon are useless unless you find them with a high CP. Since finding other pokemon in their evolution line is going to be tough so you can’t evolve them or power them up easily. This is why starters are useless, unable to be leveled up or evolved easily. So common pokemon like pigdeys and weedles are going to be your best friend as their evolution line is very commonly found.

4.   Visit Downtown Naperville for supplies

There are literally about 40 pokemon stops in downtown along, pokemon stops are what give you supplies for free like, potions, revives and pokeballs. So if you need restock supplies either from taking gyms or catching ‘em all, make sure you visit downtown for restock.
*Also hint, hint there is a great place to catch sythers, which are generally rare pokemon, downtown too.*

5.   How to catch a pokemon the right way

Alright now it’s time to teach you how to catch a pokemon the right way. First you need to know how to locate them, if you tap on the bottom right of your screen a menu will appear showing how far away certain pokemon are from you, 3 steps on the radar means the pokemon is 50 meters away, 2 steps on the radar means  the pokemon is 500 steps away, 1 step on the radar means the pokemon is 100 steps away, and lastly, 0 steps means the pokemon is within 10 steps of you. The pokemon will then appear on your screen and if you click on it, you’ll be put into a screen that looks like this. If you click on the pokeball, a ring will appear as shown in the left picture. With either a green, a yellow or a red ring getting smaller. The green means an easy catch while yellow means harder with red being the hardest to catch. If you are able to throw the pokeball inside the ring you will get bonus catch rates.
When the ring is still generally big, you will get a ‘nice’ rating, if it’s smaller than a ‘great’, with the best throw being if you throw it in the ring at its smallest you will get an ‘excellent’ throw and thus have a high chance of catching the pokemon. You can also spin the pokeball by moving it in a circular motion before throwing to receive a curveball bonus; Which will give you extra XP. Also, if you use a razzberry before you capture a pokemon, it will be more likely to be caught.

So now you know some tips for Pokemon Go. This game is also so much fun with friends; take this opportunity to run around outside with them and go on adventures. Just remember to be the best like no one ever was.