Pokemon water balloon fight on SCCC campus

By Laurie Gordon
NEWTON — If you happened to be on the campus of Sussex County Community College on Monday shortly after noon, you might have seen something really neat and certainly out of the ordinary: a Pokemon Go Water Balloon Fight. Right there, on the field by the gazebo, a group of students were having a blast with water balloons and a new game that's all the rage, all in the name of boosting funds for the SCCC Anime Club.
Candice Christiano is a student at Sussex County Community College, an Anime Club member and an innovative thinker who harnessed students' new love of Pokemon to create a fundraiser on Monday, at 12:30. It was rather last minute to get the approval, but Christiano made it work, and the future teacher was happy with the event.
Anyone who wanted to participated had the choice of spending three dollars for 12 water balloons or five dollars for 24.
"The way it worked was we formed Pokemon Go teams. The Teams were named Valor, Mystic and Instinct," Christiano said. "The game was to throw water balloons at the opposite teams to try to prevent them from catching the Pokemon in the virtual game."
Christiano explained, "I came up with the idea for a water balloon fight for a fundraiser by talking to family, friends and other club members to figure out a unique way to raise money for our club besides having a bake sale like everyone else. So after discussing it for a few months we all agreed on a water balloon fight. We talked to our Advisor Melanie Arpaio first before we brought the idea up to the person who is in charge of setting up all the club fundraisers at the college."
Released in July, Pokemon Go is a mobile app that you can download for iOS or Anrdoid. The game works by using your phone’s GPS for your real-world location and augmented reality to bring up those cool-looking Pokémon on your screen, overlaid on top of what you see in front of you. Furthermore you—as in the digital you —can be customized with clothing, a faction (or “team” of players you can join) and other options, and you level up as you play. People have been "catching" Pokemon since it's release. Pokemon Go has been all the rage and is one of the most used mobile apps thus far in 2016. It has been downloaded more than 500 million times worldwide and is lauded for promoting physical activity and just plain fun for kids and adults.
An anime club is an organization that meets to discuss, show, and promote anime in a local community setting and can also focus on broadening Japanese cultural understanding. Anime clubs are increasingly found at colleges, universities and high schools.