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Taiwan’s Pokémon Go granddad is still at it and now has twice as many phones

Master Blaster Mar 13, 2019
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What? Uncle Pokémon is evolving!

After making headlines around the globe last year, you’ve probably heard of Chen San-yuan. Wanting to be the very best Pokémon Go trainer, like no one ever was, he amassed a collection of smartphones and took the the streets of Taipei with them mounted on his customized bike to catch Jigglypuffs and Shuckles.

He began back in 2016 when the Pokémon Go craze took hold of Taiwan, much like other parts of the world. However, Chen’s love for the game grew larger than a single smartphone could contain, so he began collecting more.

Photo of the Day: Pic that made Taiwan's 'Uncle #Pokemon' famous #PokemonGo https://t.co/8nMLCwrH0M @taiwannews886 pic.twitter.com/EOXhNJROZp

— Jim Stevenson (@VOAStevenson) August 13, 2018

By the time images of him under the nickname “Uncle Pokémon” went viral on Reddit, he was sporting around a dozen or so phones. Chen told media in 2018 that when an account goes above level 30 it gets a spot on the Pokébike.

However, a more recent sighting by Twitter user (@SCMcrocodile) of Uncle Pokémon has shown that his array of phones seems to be growing at an exponential rate.

台湾のポケモンマスターの進化はとどまるところを知らない pic.twitter.com/byrXqJWcke

— あじ豚 (@SCMcrocodile) March 9, 2019

Yes, it certainly appears that this “Uncle Pokémon” has evolved into “Grandpa Pokémon” with 21 smartphones on his bike rack and an additional two in the basket for a total of 23 simultaneous Pokémon Go accounts.

Considering Chen’s criteria for mounting phones and the fact that the game stops leveling over 40 he has earned somewhere between 138 million and 460 million experience points (XP) cumulatively, and that’s not counting his accounts under level 30 that aren’t present on his bike. Considering he gets 100 XP from a basic Pokémon catch, he’s been pretty busy.

▼ One down, 4,181,818 to go!

The recent spike in smartphones is no doubt attributed to the addition of raid battles in which players can team up to take on super strong Pokémon and earn up to 10,000 exp at once. In the video we can see him single-handedly take on a raid battle against an Alola Raichu.

However, since a maximum of only 20 people can take part in a single raid battle, Chen can’t even employ all of his phones at once. Not that it matters, as even with stretching his fingers to the limit, he can only seem to manage about six or seven screens to battle on at the same time.

Still, he seems to be having a great time with the game, and as the young girl watching on in the video as well as reader comments attest, he remains a continuing source of entertainment for us all.

“It looks like he’s playing a rhythm game.”
“This is like the Pokémon equivalent of those people who live with 40 cats.”
“Hey, that’s a violation of the Terms of Service!”
“Last time I saw him he had about 12 phones. That’s some improvement!”
“Wow.”
“At this point is he controlling the Pokémon, or the other way around?”
“He is a Pokémon Master.”
“How can he see when he’s riding that thing?”

It’s true the the ToS for Pokémon Go forbids the handling of multiple accounts, but Niantic doesn’t seem to enforce it too strictly. They reserve the right to, however, and late last year they issued a 30-day ban to high-profile trainer Brandon Tan who also sells his services to rapidly level up others’ accounts.

Tan’s account was suddenly suspended last September which some believe was a response by Niantic regarding his offer to sell highly appraised Mewtwos for real cash during a special event where they were more readily available to players.

@NianticLabs @NianticLabs Just got this message while feeding berries to the gym after I was done with a Mewtwo raid 🤔 May I know what is going on? Thank you. pic.twitter.com/AiLK15wOcv

— BrandonTan91 (@brandontan91) September 29, 2018

https://twitter.com/ShinyDessi/status/1045833643816636416

Commercial Services=Break ToS
Sharing Account=Break ToS
Multi Accounts=Break ToS
Botted Maps/Scanners=Break ToS
Follow a friend who use Map to hunt=Break ToS

I wonder why only after 2 yrs that Niantic decided to take action on my services, more specifically on my account 🤷‍♂️

— BrandonTan91 (@brandontan91) October 2, 2018

Seventy-year-old Chen, on the other hand, doesn’t seem to have such ulterior motives and claims the main reason he plays is to stave off senility. He might be right, but if that cloud of Pokélectromagnetic radiation mounted to his handlebars gets any bigger, he might find himself in a different kind of trouble.