Ishihara said that locales used in the original Pokémon game were inspired by real biomes, and thus it was a small step to envision Pokémon as something that one could find while visiting the Eiffel Tower, for example. The teaser video for the game suggested that some Pokémon would only be specific to certain locales, such as water, as in the console games.
Ingress has a strong social community based around the game, especially in Japan, where special events called anomalies pull in thousands of agents who engage in battle for the day. Ishihara described Pokémon as having a similar social community because of the necessity of seeking out other trainers with whom to swap and battle.
But the new Pokémon Go seeks to also keep trainers from always having to stare at their mobile devices, with the introduction of a new wearable called the Pokémon Go Plus. Its minimal functionality consists solely of Bluetooth LE, an LED and haptic feedback, allowing users to receive notifications of when something might be happening in the game, and maybe visually advertise their status as a Pokémon trainer.