This is a trainwreck the degree to which I have never seen before.
After being delayed over an hour, the stream finally starts. John Hanke is brought on stage to address the crowd, but they aren't happy. Turns out, the servers have been an absolute mess to event goers, including for check-in which means the lineup outside is still massive right now, and he actually gets heckled. Visibly shaken, he stresses that Niantic is doing their best to sort out the issues. For now, the show must go on! A scheduled half hour of global Pokemon catching will contribute to a number of individual global bonuses and unlock another challenge later in the day for event goers. Unfortunately, after the half hour was up, only one such individual challenge was at halfway, and the overall challenge was 1/3 to bronze. This... can't have been what they were expecting.
Better still, the camera has zoomed in on 2 event goers' phones so far. The first one was trying and failing to connect their Go Plus accessory before looking at the camera disapprovingly, and the second one was frozen in a gym. Oddly, for the latter, the camera did not cut away. It kept on this person's phone, them tapping away furiously to no avail, for a solid 2 minutes. Meanwhile, they've got a hot mic in the crowd for some audio ambiance, and every time it picks up audible dialogue, it's something to the effect of, "I dunno, it's not working." or "The servers just crashed again."
After a 15 minute extension and another announcement by John Hanke which was not streamed, the challenge window ends and a host summons a few cohosts to the stage for some light banter before cutting to a video. It's a pre-recorded tutorial on raid battles. The audio is clearly distorted, and after around 30 seconds, it cuts out completely. Stream cuts to a splash screen. The crowd boos and chants, and the host does not again take the stage. After a few minutes, music starts back up and... people are left to their devices?
I'm very confused, but this is amazing. What an absolute trainwreck so far.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yktrQAJNbAc
Rewind the stream if you wanna catch what I've talked about. It's only just begun.
EDIT: I should also mention that the first hour of the stream was plagued with periodic Windows 'usb device connected/disconnected' sound effects, and the occasional mic check.
Even now on the hot crowd mic, you can hear people yelling. They're not happy. People flew out to this event from around the country.
After being delayed over an hour, the stream finally starts. John Hanke is brought on stage to address the crowd, but they aren't happy. Turns out, the servers have been an absolute mess to event goers, including for check-in which means the lineup outside is still massive right now, and he actually gets heckled. Visibly shaken, he stresses that Niantic is doing their best to sort out the issues. For now, the show must go on! A scheduled half hour of global Pokemon catching will contribute to a number of individual global bonuses and unlock another challenge later in the day for event goers. Unfortunately, after the half hour was up, only one such individual challenge was at halfway, and the overall challenge was 1/3 to bronze. This... can't have been what they were expecting.
Better still, the camera has zoomed in on 2 event goers' phones so far. The first one was trying and failing to connect their Go Plus accessory before looking at the camera disapprovingly, and the second one was frozen in a gym. Oddly, for the latter, the camera did not cut away. It kept on this person's phone, them tapping away furiously to no avail, for a solid 2 minutes. Meanwhile, they've got a hot mic in the crowd for some audio ambiance, and every time it picks up audible dialogue, it's something to the effect of, "I dunno, it's not working." or "The servers just crashed again."
After a 15 minute extension and another announcement by John Hanke which was not streamed, the challenge window ends and a host summons a few cohosts to the stage for some light banter before cutting to a video. It's a pre-recorded tutorial on raid battles. The audio is clearly distorted, and after around 30 seconds, it cuts out completely. Stream cuts to a splash screen. The crowd boos and chants, and the host does not again take the stage. After a few minutes, music starts back up and... people are left to their devices?
I'm very confused, but this is amazing. What an absolute trainwreck so far.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yktrQAJNbAc
Rewind the stream if you wanna catch what I've talked about. It's only just begun.
EDIT: I should also mention that the first hour of the stream was plagued with periodic Windows 'usb device connected/disconnected' sound effects, and the occasional mic check.
Even now on the hot crowd mic, you can hear people yelling. They're not happy. People flew out to this event from around the country.