A Guardian writer marks Pokémon Go's tenth anniversary by reflecting on how the augmented-reality game, which has been downloaded 800 million times across 150 countries and has seen a trillion Pokémon caught, reshaped their relationship with the outside world. Released in 2016, the game turned ordinary walks around the writer's home town of Frome into adventures, and its social gym-battle feature gave their autistic son a new way to connect with other children.

Though their sons have since grown up, the writer says the game's underlying habit never fully left them, evolving instead into a collection of nature and tracking apps used on every walk. These include Seek, which identifies plants via image recognition; the Merlin Bird ID app for identifying birdsong; and Flightradar24 and MarineTraffic for tracking planes and ships. The writer credits Pokémon Go with instilling a lasting, almost childlike curiosity about everyday surroundings, turning the natural world into what they describe as a vast, playable space full of small discoveries.