Level Ball Logs

Welcome to Safari Ball, a field guide series that explores how Pokémon evolve through behavior, emotion, and environment. Out where the sea breathes slowly beneath the ice, where icebergs drift like sleeping giants, and the sun glints off fr…

Welcome to Safari Ball, a field guide series that explores how Pokémon evolve through behavior, emotion, and environment. In the humid forests of Alola, if you stand still long enough, you’ll hear it. The soft staccato tap-tap-tap echo…

Welcome to Safari Ball, a field guide series that explores how Pokémon evolve through behavior, emotion, and environment. In the hush of tall, reedy grasses, something stirs, a rustle, a quiet swish, a green stalk slices the air like a pract…

Welcome to Safari Ball, a field guide series that explores how Pokémon evolve through behavior, emotion, and environment. There’s a stillness that settles over the wetlands just before dusk. The water ripples softly, reflecting the amb…

Welcome to Safari Ball, a field guide series that explores how Pokémon evolve through behavior, emotion, and environment.  In the quiet stillness of a dry field, a sharp cry cuts through the air, not just once, but again and again. It&r…

Welcome to Safari Ball, a field guide series that explores how Pokémon evolve through behavior, emotion, and environment. Sometimes, when the fog clings low and the wind barely moves, you might spot something drifting just above the ground. …

Welcome to Safari Ball, a field guide series that explores how Pokémon evolve through behavior, emotion, and environment. In the hush of twilight, the forest stills. The breeze slows. The rustle of leaves quiets. And somewhere among the trun…

Welcome to Safari Ball, a field guide series that explores how Pokémon evolve through behavior, emotion, and environment. Some Pokémon invite you to look at the world differently. On misty nights, deep inside ancient ruins or floating…

Welcome to Safari Ball, a field guide series that explores how Pokémon evolve through behavior, emotion, and environment.A morning wind brushes across the skin, carrying the scent of wildflowers and the hush of something magical. Petals dance…

Welcome to Safari Ball, a field guide series that explores how Pokémon evolve through behavior, emotion, and environment.If you’re ever near a mossy cliffside at dawn, listen carefully. You might hear a sharp caw! followed by a blur of …

Welcome to Safari Ball, a field guide series that explores how Pokémon evolve through behavior, emotion, and environment. On a quiet morning near the riverbanks of Paldea, the reeds part with a rustle and there it is. A small, white duckling…

Welcome to Safari Ball, a field guide series that explores how Pokémon evolve through behavior, emotion, and environment. In the dappled morning light, a quiet rustle stirs beneath a city hedge. A pair of curious brown eyes peek out, soft, b…

I remember the day I sent the message that changed everything. I wasn’t sure I was ready to lead. But I had already spent years helping my local Pokémon GO community organizing raids, giving advice, showing up even when no one asked me…

Welcome to Safari Ball, a field guide series that explores how Pokémon evolve through behavior, emotion, and environment. You hear them before you see them. The echo of metal against stone. Clang. Pause. Clang again. Somewhere high in the m…

Welcome to Safari Ball, a field guide series that explores how Pokémon evolve through behavior, emotion, and environment. “It lets out billows of steam and disappears into the dense fog. It's said to live in mountains where humans do…

What if the rarest thing you find at GO Fest isn’t a Pokémon but peace? New York City hadn’t changed, but I had. GO Fest 2024 marked my return, but this time, I did it differently. I stayed in the city, not across the river in Ne…

Have you ever felt completely invisible until someone finally saw you? New York City is loud. It’s layered. It moves fast and it never waits for you to catch up. New York City felt like a pure Electric-type with high energy, unpredictable…

By 2022, I’d already been to three GO Fests in Chicago, and while I loved the city, I was ready for something new. When Niantic announced that GO Fest was coming to Seattle, I knew it was time. It was my first time ever heading west, and after…

When BrandonTan91 came to visit, we talked for hours. About Pokemon GO, about the grind, but more importantly, about the people. I remember opening up to him about my hopes for rebuilding the Pokémon GO community in Dallas after the pandemic.…

By the time GO Fest 2019 rolled around, I felt like a veteran. It was my third year attending and the second time back at Grant Park. But for once, I wasn’t going alone. This year, I was joined by friends, some of them experiencing GO Fest for…

In 2017, I left GO Fest Chicago sunburnt, disappointed, and emotionally exhausted. But I also left determined. If I ever got another chance, I’d do it differently. That chance came in 2018. Tickets were once again hard to get, and I was lucky …

Welcome to Safari Ball, a field guide series that explores how Pokémon evolve through behavior, emotion, and environment. This time we journey high in the mist-covered mountains and see something move. Not with stealth, but with purpose, a rh…

Starting a podcast felt a lot like stepping out of my front door in Pallet Town for the first time. It was exciting, terrifying, and full of unknowns. I was scared of exposure, scared that putting myself out there would be seen as selfish or attenti…

I still remember the excitement that buzzed through the Pokémon GO community leading up to the very first GO Fest in 2017. It was the first-ever GO Fest, and somehow, it belonged to me. I almost didn’t get a ticket. The event sold out i…