"A Link Between Pokemon & Wayfarer" ft. QuartzLeo | TRAINER'S EYE #30

QuartzLeo, a Pokémon GO player from Panama, reveals the unique challenges and rewards of playing in his region. From Shiny hunting to using Niantic Wayfarer to add PokéStops and Gyms in Pokemon GO, he’s worked to make his community more active and connected. Discover how he’s used his passion for Pokémon GO to enhance the game for players in Panama and build a stronger, more engaged community.

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Sources
Opening Song: "Forget You" by Alex_MakeMusic from Pixabay

Transcript

Introduction

Interview with QuartzLeo

David Hernandez 0:00

My name is David Hernandez and you're listening to As The Pokeball Turns. Welcome to As The Pokeball Turns. Where we interview people around the community on how their Pokemon Go journey started, where it has been and where it is currently going. The Republic of Panama is a small country that links both North and South America. Given its unique location, for many centuries, it was seen as a potential landing spot for what would later be known as the Panama Canal, which made Panama the integral link for trading between the Pacific and Atlantic oceans. The way Panama connects the world can also be seen with nature thanks to its biodiversity and the only place in the world where you can see the sun rise on the Pacific and set on the Atlantic. With how much Panama's existence is centered around connection, maybe what the country says rings true? Panama is not the destination, but the journey to discover more of what truly matters. My guest is from the Republic of Panama and shares what it's like playing Pokemon Go in his country. He is also a Wayfarer ambassador, which is a Wayfarer Explorer who is active within the Wayfarer community and passionate about exploration and connecting with other people. Here's his origin story into the world of Pokemon Go. This is QuartzLeo! Today I'm joined by a Wayfarer ambassador known as Quartz Leo. I hope I got that name right. Welcome to the show, QuartzLeo!

QuartzLeo 2:04

Thank you. Thank you. And definitely you did get it right in the first try.

David Hernandez 2:08

Yes. All right. I wasn't too sure. Well, awesome my friend, I heard you on the Wayspotters Podcast but I'm looking forward to just talking about Pokemon because you seem like a very dedicated Pokemon person, so let's start with the first question I ask all my guests. When did you first start playing Pokemon GO?

QuartzLeo 2:26

Well, officially almost at the beginning of, the craze right there. But at the time, it was a little deserted over here, mostly Zubats at the time, so I only had caught my starter and then a couple Pokemon around and then I took a break until 2018 and then I went all in on 2018.

David Hernandez 2:45

So you were basically living the Gen one cave scene with Zubats everywhere nonstop.

QuartzLeo 2:49

Exactly.

David Hernandez 2:51

So you said that your area was kind of barren, it sounds like, so how barren are we talking about? Can you kind of gimme an idea?

QuartzLeo 2:57

Near my place where I lived, there was only one gym and about three Pokestops.

David Hernandez 3:03

That's it?

QuartzLeo 3:03

That's it. And it was for at least a radius of four kilometers, something like that.

David Hernandez 3:07

Wow. That's not much for those who are in America, that's about three miles, I believe, give or take.

QuartzLeo 3:13

Something like that, yep.

David Hernandez 3:14

I guess you dropped off because there just wasn't much to do with the lack of stuff around you. Is that kind of what happened?

QuartzLeo 3:20

Pretty much. Um, also at the time I didn't have like a cellular, data contract. Sometimes what would happen is I would be running on public wifi and oh, out of range!" Lost service and took me about until 2018 to get a personal contract for myself so I could just play all day, every day, every time I could.

David Hernandez 3:39

What were your expectations when you heard about Pokemon Go?

QuartzLeo 3:43

Originally I did believe that it was a April fools joke way back when I first saw it, because I thought it really, I really thought it was, and then I was expecting that we would actually see like arc, that you'd have to move your phone around to actually see the Pokemon. I noticed, oh no, it's just tapping it and then you can see it. I was expecting more like AR integrated system, but that was way beyond what we had available at the time of technology.

David Hernandez 4:09

That's true. Pokemon Go's idea did come from, I don't know if you remember this, there was an April Fool's joke with Google Maps where they had Pokemon on the map thing, and you can go catch them. Did you know about that?

QuartzLeo 4:19

Uh, I probably mixed them up with the ad trailer. If I, I probably thought the trailer was the actual April Fool's joke at the time.

David Hernandez 4:28

I never did it to myself to be honest, I just remember seeing people post screenshots on Facebook, and stuff like that. And it would just be Google Maps and they'd just have like a Mew in the middle of a random street or whatever, and I think that's what eventually led the Pokemon Go.

QuartzLeo 4:41

Oh, I didn't know at the time. I was just browsing YouTube at the time.

David Hernandez 4:44

Oh, that's fair. Do you have any familiarity with Pokemon before Pokemon Go?

QuartzLeo 4:48

Yep. I've been playing since, way back, since I was a kid. I was playing, Pokemon Red, but I first, was mostly exposed, was through the anime. So I watched the anime, there would be reruns randomly, and then I just started from episode one again because I just randomly decided to start over from the beginning all the way to Hoenn.

David Hernandez 5:08

Do you have a particular favorite, generation at all?

QuartzLeo 5:11

Well, my favorite Pokemon is from generation two Lavitar. However, my favorite generation is actually Hoenn. That's the one I love a lot. I honestly really wished for the time I kept playing Pokemon Ruby all the time. I was trying to see if I could maybe force, to get Deoxys or Deoxys, I don't know how it's actually said.

David Hernandez 5:31

Oh, are you talking about the rockets?

QuartzLeo 5:33

Correct. I was going to the Rockets, I was checking the White Rock, I was like, what does the White Rock mean? When people were saying in schools, they were saying like, that White Rock means you can get Jirachi and I'm like, okay, how do I get a Jirachi? And I kept just trying and trying.

David Hernandez 5:46

So real quick, for those who were listening, what he's talking about was in Mossdeep City, there was like a NASA space center basically and there was this one random guy who... I think he would say like a random number. Right? Or days with the rockets. The rumor back in the day, this is way back before the internet is nowadays, was that when it reached to, I believe a hundred or something like that, you could get on a ship all and fly all the way to the moon to get to Deoxys. right? That's what it was?

QuartzLeo 6:12

Yep. That was it. That was it.

David Hernandez 6:16

And then fools, like me and him spend hours upon hours waiting for the in-game clock to go to the next day hoping like we hit the 100 rocket just so we can get the Deoxys cuz we just didn't know any better.

QuartzLeo 6:29

So and behold you had to go to a physical event,

David Hernandez 6:33

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, this is when regionals were really were a thing. You couldn't get it.

QuartzLeo 6:38

Yeah.

David Hernandez 6:39

So have you played Pokemon all the way through? Did you ever skip a generation at all?

QuartzLeo 6:43

This is the funny part. I did skip at one point, I didn't play Gen two all the way through. I stopped because it was not mine, somebody uh, lended to me and I did not play gen two up until I was playing generation four. Then I went back and played generation two and played it all the way in,

David Hernandez 7:02

Are you talking about with HeartGold and SoulSilver or you actually went back and played the original Gold and Silver?

QuartzLeo 7:06

I went back and played the original gold.

David Hernandez 7:08

Wow. Okay. That's some dedication right there. I would've just stuck with the remix.

QuartzLeo 7:13

I did play the remix of Fire Red a lot.

David Hernandez 7:17

Oh really? How long was that?

QuartzLeo 7:18

That was, a 959 hours of 59 minutes.

David Hernandez 7:23

959. Wait 959 hours and 59 minutes. Like actual 9-5-9?

QuartzLeo 7:31

Actual 9-5-9. It just got locked there, it didn't move forward.

David Hernandez 7:35

So you played beyond that, it just that's the further it would go,

QuartzLeo 7:39

That was the highest it would count.

David Hernandez 7:41

So what would you do on Fire Red for 959 hours? I'm curious.

QuartzLeo 7:45

So, I had this thing from generation one, when I first played Pokemon Blue. Someone told me you didn't actually finish the game until your entire team was level 100. I had one team that was level 100, but it was only like Pokemon I was using every day just to gain coins. But then, I eventually decided I'm going to shiny hunt.

David Hernandez 8:08

Oh, no,

QuartzLeo 8:11

And then I decided I'm going to get every single item you can get from a Pokemon by catching it, checking the Pokemon's inventory, and if they were holding, let's say, Lucky Egg, but you could only get catching Chanseys. Then I kept going to the Safari Zone, catching Chanseys, going to the safari zone, catching Chanseys until I had at least two lucky eggs, and then I would level up the Pokemons until one level 100

David Hernandez 8:38

On fire Red. Did you just do it on Fire Red or do you like trade to other games to kinda get that experience boost?

QuartzLeo 8:43

I did have a couple of Pokemon that people traded over from LeafGreen and from, Emerald. Somebody gave me some Pokemon from Colosseum to complete the Johto Dex.

David Hernandez 8:54

Did you actually complete the Dex though for Fire Red?

QuartzLeo 8:57

Almost everything but Mew and Deoxys and

David Hernandez 9:00

Wow. That's crazy, dude.

QuartzLeo 9:03

I felt very proud. I had, the badge like, Hey, you completed the Pokedex, because even though you actually didn't get the mythical, it still counted when you went to speak with Professor Oak and they register. Oh, you did this, you completed a Pokedex and I went to Celadon City where the Game Freak people were and also I got the little certificate in game for it.

David Hernandez 9:22

you deserve it.

QuartzLeo 9:26

That was my little, um, hyper fixation, so to speak.

David Hernandez 9:29

So here's the crazy part, cause I played a lot of Gen three and I think the amount of time you put in a FireRed beats my entire combined time with all five games, Ruby, Sapphire, Emerald, LeafGreen, and FireRed, and Colosseum, and XD Gale of Darkness.

QuartzLeo 9:44

Wow. I didn't even think about it, I just was playing it when I got home from school, playing it again on my way to school, playing it on my way back from school, just playing it all the time.

David Hernandez 9:55

That's crazy, dude, like, I mean, mad respect, no lie, but man, 959 hours. The most I've clocked in ever on a Pokemon game, honestly, I think would've been Black2 and that clocked in at 400 and something hours and that's it for me, I mean, for one game.

QuartzLeo 10:11

Oh, you played more than me. you played more hours than me on Pokemon Pearl. I kind of just finished it and never touched it again.

David Hernandez 10:18

I can't go back to the game dude. It's too slow.

QuartzLeo 10:21

Oh, it's,

David Hernandez 10:21

I've tried to do it. I tried playing and it's just painful.

QuartzLeo 10:24

Yeah. the mashing, the amount of mashing air that I would do so,

David Hernandez 10:28

and you're just waiting for the text to just go slow and then, yeah. No fun. So we come back, said 2018 is when you returned?

QuartzLeo 10:35

Yep.

David Hernandez 10:35

What made you come back in 2018?

QuartzLeo 10:38

Ironically enough, it was the first Squirtles Community Day. That's what caught my attention at the time. I didn't even know, there was Shinies, I was like, oh, there's no Shinies, Oh, well. And then Shinies, wait, what I'm getting that! And I just, got back to the game immediately. I go between heavy grinding for Shinies I would catch or sometimes I would just go, shiny, no, shiny, no, shiny, no, go. Oh, you just reminded me why I got into shiny hunting. So I discovered about Pokemon Emerald's, broken RNG timer. And I just kept restarting until I found my shiny frame, every time, and I just like, this exact second, guarantee shiny, every single time. Normally all Pokemon games have a timer that only counts like, it's like a seed. In-game seed for all of your shinies. It's guaranteed, but it also is, not supposed to be able to be predicted. So every time you boot up the game, it's completely new. Pokemon Emerald, it was broken and every single time, the moment you saved your profile, it was counting that timer exactly to the tee. So you could go, okay, I know on second number 15, you'll have a shiny guaranteed. And the way to check for it would be when you're first encountering your Pokemon in the little, quest To protect the professor. When you protect the professor from the Pokemon, either your starter or the Pokemon attacking the professor will be shiny. And that's how I would figure out, at this exact second, it's going to be my shiny frame. I'll just have to make sure to count the seconds as soon as I start the game and it will work specifically for wild Pokemon only.

David Hernandez 12:19

So what's your most prized shiny Pokemon?

QuartzLeo 12:22

If I'm not mistaken, I think my rarest shiny, but I know, I don't know anyone who has it right now, it's Smeargle. I wish I had as a shiny ditto, everyone has it but me.

David Hernandez 12:33

Ah dang dude.

QuartzLeo 12:34

There was another one that was pretty rare at the time because they removed it for some time and then they added it back accidentally, they realized, oops, we, we forgot to enable it for everyone, which was, uh, Magnemite. As soon as they released it, I got it and it was gone, and they patched it back

David Hernandez 12:52

From your collection or just gone from being able to get it.

QuartzLeo 12:54

Oh, you weren't able to get it at all for like a couple months. Oh, and I guess nobody actually has these anymore, Blastoise.

David Hernandez 13:01

Oh, sunglasses, Blastoise?

QuartzLeo 13:04

Yeah, sunglasses, Blastoise. Nobody has it anymore.

David Hernandez 13:06

Mm-hmm. It only came back one time during the Ed Sheeran event, and that's about it.

QuartzLeo 13:10

That's about it.

David Hernandez 13:11

When you came back though, I guess it was still a problem for you to be able to play much though, cause y'all didn't have as much Pokestops or gyms, true?

QuartzLeo 13:18

Yep. So there was only three places you could actually play which was Albrook Mall, which is the biggest mall of Central America. So it was guaranteed there was at least some Pokestops at the time because a lot of it was very low density. And then there was, what we call Casco Antiguo, which is the old city of Panama, which was founded a long time ago. That had a lot of Pokestops and the density of Pokemon was pretty high, so if you walked around for a while, you could farm a lot. And the national university, which had a lot more Pokestops and gyms than everywhere else, but you could only play on weekdays because it was closed on the weekends.

David Hernandez 13:55

Oh, is it gated?

QuartzLeo 13:55

Gated during the week. Every other day, anyone can come in.

David Hernandez 13:59

So I guess most of the community days are probably, I guess, the mall.

QuartzLeo 14:01

Yep. The mall mostly. There's also our National Park, but that one's a little, a little complicated because it's sometimes marshy, sometimes not. Depends on the weather.

David Hernandez 14:11

What is it like in Panama? Like what's the climate like?

QuartzLeo 14:14

Either intense sunlight or heavy rains all the time.

David Hernandez 14:19

So you basically got glued on or kyo basically over there.

QuartzLeo 14:22

Basically. A whole drought for drizzle.

David Hernandez 14:25

Oh my gosh. Sounds like Texas and Summer

QuartzLeo 14:28

Yep.

David Hernandez 14:28

So eventually though, what helped you improve the area was you got involved into Wayfarer, right?

QuartzLeo 14:33

Yep. I was thinking, well, a lot of the things around me are good, potential Pokestops. They exist everywhere else, how come over here We don't have any? And I got into Wayfarer to try and boost everywhere else what I saw. If I saw park on the way, new Pokestop for someone, even if I don't play there.

David Hernandez 14:50

How much have you improved your area since doing Wayfair? Like before and after? Like, gimme an idea.

QuartzLeo 14:55

Well, now there is about, let me see, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 gyms still, they're always red

David Hernandez 15:02

Wow. Okay. Is Valor pretty dominant over there?

QuartzLeo 15:05

Not everywhere, just where I live, for some reason, they're always dominant where I live.

David Hernandez 15:10

So, how difficult was it to get into Wayfarer cause I know that it's very challenging, like it's not always clear?

QuartzLeo 15:16

I didn't really get it at first. I was confused as to what was why was this okay and like, is this not okay? I didn't get the rules, at the beginning, then slowly I had to read up a lot of old stuff that people were posting or old threads, and I was like, oh, this is how you do it. Some people got into it and they were like, oh, let's just try and nominate stuff and see what we can get. Some nominated their trees, some, you know, nominated, some new stuff like parks that I didn't even know about. Made me actually focus on getting that, new badge for exploring new Pokestops now. I'm ready on that one.

David Hernandez 15:49

The Explorer badge, I think. Right? That's what it's called.

QuartzLeo 15:53

I think so, yeah, something like that, let's see, sightseer.

David Hernandez 15:56

There we go Sightseer!

QuartzLeo 15:57

Yep. That's my next goal is completing all my badges. I really wanna, make up for all the time that I took off because, during, 2020, I kind of just went down again on Pokemon Go for a while.

David Hernandez 16:09

A lot of us did. Well, last question on the Wayfarer. If somebody was wanting to get into it and they wanted to build up their community, what would you tell'em? Like how could they learn about the Wayfarer system?

QuartzLeo 16:20

My best suggestion when it comes to how to get into Wayfarer, it's actually just, look what's being posted on Reddit or on the Wayfarer forums. It's pretty solid and you immediately catch what's not accepted right away as opposed to going blindly and just nominating because at least now, you know,"okay, don't post this otherwise, I'm gonna appear on this thread again."

David Hernandez 16:44

Or you might be an episode of Wayspotters with"Coal of the Week.".

QuartzLeo 16:47

Exactly!

David Hernandez 16:50

Shout out to those guys, they're awesome!

QuartzLeo 16:51

Yep.

David Hernandez 16:52

Well, awesome Quartzleo, I appreciate you coming on the show. If people wanted to check out any of your stuff, I know you like to draw in your spare time, if you wanna plug your stuff, by all means.

QuartzLeo 17:01

Oh yeah. right now I'm posting more often on my Instagram. I don't post every day because I'm in a new job, so I'm getting settled. I'll be posting more often on my Instagram@QuartzLeo_.

Thank You For Listening! :)

David Hernandez 17:14

Awesome and I'll make sure to link it into the description of today's episode. Thank you for listening to an episode of As The Pokeball Turns! You can subscribe to this podcast on Apple, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app. Feel free to follow me on all my socials by clicking the link in the description of this episode, and I'll see you next time. Here's the sneak peek for the next episode of As The Pokeball Turns.