New Pokémon Society wants students to help catch ‘em all

A Trent Pokémon Society has been founded by a group of dedicated fans.

The new soc was created by president Sue-Ling Chan-Wyles, 21, who held a screening of the franchise’s first animated film in the Newton building on February 5.

The society will work through all 21 movies and plans to hold events for the card game and video games, including Pokémon Go (PoGo).

“When I was in first year, I was kind of sad there wasn’t a specific society,” said Sue-Ling, whose favourite character is Togepi. “I know there’s obviously gaming, and then you have anime, but there wasn’t anything specific to Pokémon. “I know there’s loads of Pokémon lovers at NTU – I know that for a fact – so I thought I might as well make one.”

Vice president Katie James, 20, added: “There’s quite a lot of Facebook pages for Nottingham PoGo players in general, like ‘Clifton Raids’ and stuff like that, so at the start of the year we decided maybe we should do something.”

Their first PoGo meet-up will be a collaboration with the Rock Society on February 16, followed by a board-game session at The Dice Cup where the committee will discuss what events people are interested in.

Planned events include a themed Valentine’s card workshop on February 12 and a fancy-dress trip to Ocean in March.

Katie, from Kent, said: “We thought it was going to be difficult to actually put it out there and get the members, but within literally one night of just posting it on Facebook groups we had about 20 to 30 people that were at least interested.”

George Lipyeat, 22, the treasurer, said the soc’s greatest challenge lies in “converting the interest into participation.”

He added: “Everyone knows of Pokémon and a lot of people have an interest in it but going to an event specifically for that is a bit of a jump.”

The committee are in the process of looking for a sponsor who can provide a venue for tournaments and someone clued-up enough on the rules of each game to umpire matches.

If you want to go Pokémon hunting or feel like reliving your memories of the movies, email the society at NTSUPokemon@su.ntu.ac.uk or join their Facebook group.

By Jamie Morris