Pokemon GO celebrated its 10th anniversary on July 9 with a massive billboard takeover and a live-streamed raid in New York City's Times Square [1].

The event serves as a milestone for the augmented reality title, fulfilling a promise made by the developers when the game first launched a decade ago [1, 2].

The celebration culminated in a Mega Mewtwo Y raid that brought together 1,500 trainers [2]. While some reports described the crowd as hundreds of invited players [3], the raid was a central piece of the anniversary's public spectacle. The event was broadcast via a livestream that concluded at 9:45 p.m. EDT on July 9 [4].

Kim Adams, vice president of game development for Pokemon GO at Scopely, represented the leadership during the festivities [1]. The project is a collaborative effort between Niantic, The Pokemon Company, and Scopely [1].

By taking over the billboards in Times Square, the organizers recreated the scale and energy of the game's original promotional trailers [3]. The raid functioned as both a community gathering and a global marketing event, utilizing the high-visibility location to signal the game's continued relevance in the mobile market [1, 2].

The event highlighted the evolution of the game's social mechanics, moving from small group encounters to massive, coordinated raids involving more than 1,000 people in a single physical location [2].

“1,500 trainers joined the Mega Mewtwo Y raid.”

The scale of the 10th-anniversary event demonstrates the enduring commercial viability of augmented reality gaming. By coordinating a thousand-person raid in one of the world's most visited locations, the developers are signaling that Pokemon GO has transitioned from a viral trend into a permanent fixture of digital entertainment and urban social interaction.