The security guard assigned to the mall door is fucking unimpressed. I imagine she showed up for work in the afternoon having forgotten that she would be working late. Her hair is pulled taught into a humourless ponytail. “How can I help you?” she asks as we roll up to the door.
“We’re here for the Pokémon midnight launch.” My daughter says.
Inside, the lights of the Midtown are dimmed, and the stores are all shuttered. It is 9:40 PM on a Wednesday and we are going to pick up our pre-order copy of Pokémon Z-A at the GameStop. “What if it was just us?” I snicker to my daughter.
“That would be hilarious,” she says unzipping her fall bomber jacket to reveal a very metal Meat Canyon t-shirt I hadn’t seen until tonight. She looks way too cool for the mall; most of the clothing she is wearing comes from the mall. I do not have time to ponder this as she moves swiftly down the empty hall towards the GameStop.
We are not the only ones here. Approaching the store, we are met with music from the Pokémon game series played through a tinny speaker. A friendly kid with a shaved head in an anime t-shirt beckons us over. “Number 19” he announces and thrusts an empty Pokémon Scarlet game case in our hands. The case is marked with our number. The other eighteen people sit and stand around the store entrance. Everyone looks unsure what is happening. The kid explains he is the manager and is currently handing out the pre-order keychains. “We got like, 200 of them,” he overshares, “we spent hours sorting them out”.
“I’ll take a Totodile one,” my daughter says and reaches into the box to retrieve her keychain. She often chooses the water-type starter. When she was very young, her heart belonged to Sobble – an anxious and depressive little lizard from Pokémon Sword and Shield. I frankly think she related.
“You can have one too,” the manager/kid says to me. “We have hundreds.”
“Rad, I’ll have the Tepig.”
We find a spot to wait for the doors to open and settle in. My daughter sits on the floor and begins madly messaging in a Discord channel on her phone. Pokémon has always been our thing. Of the things that were our thing, this is the thing that remains our thing. We have had a lot of things. I have not been a perfect dad, but I have definitely been around.
I have a moment to survey the slowly growing crowd of other Pokémon enthusiasts. There is no pattern, no type, no sub-genre of people. I am by far the oldest person in the group, but the range of ages, ethnicities, and genders is wide. A young man with a waxed moustache and t-shirt depicting a teepee stands next to his boyfriend. No room for closets in here his t-shirt explains. I am instantly aware of what a relic I am. Nothing makes you feel as old as recognizing progressive shifts in your own culture. Watching bigotry return to the open does the same thing. So does trying to sit down on a mall floor.
We are eventually lined up in order and are ushered into the store in groups of ten. I do not know how these places continue to exist. Even Nintendo doesn’t want to make cartridges of their games anymore. They do, but it seems begrudging. The online store is so easy. This makes me wonder why all these people are here to begin with. The cynic in me suggests it’s some vestigial impulse towards community. My better self finds it endearing; all these people gathered in the gloomy mall – waiting to take home little digital monsters.
The game costs a hundred dollars. This makes me go dead eyed. The young woman at the till needs a stool to reach the counter. She is impossibly small. “That Gardevoir pop statue is twenty percent off,” my daughter announces – it is the fifth item she has pointed out to me. She holds up the plastic statue for me to see. The receipt is printing out as she does.
As we leave the store with our game and pre-order codes and swag, I am struck by how much she has changed. The new starter she chose, Totodile, is joyous and goofy critter with a large mouth filled with sharp teeth. If you use the Totodile in enough battles, it evolves into a terrifying saurian juggernaut called a Feraligatr. I think this is something many dads wish for their daughters. For them to be fearsome and toothy.
On the way out, we pass the disgruntled security guard again. “Thanks!” my daughter says to the unflinching woman.
Outside it is dark and October cold. “I’m getting hyped,” she announces to the empty parking lot as we walk to the car.