Find Out Who the Biggest Pokémon Fans in New York City Are

Pokemon Go Meetup 1238 — People play Pokémon Go in Union Square Park.

Three weeks after its release, Pokémon Go is still all the rage in cities across America, and it's showing no signs of slowing down.

The mobile-augmented reality game that allows players to catch Pokémon in real-life locations already broke the App Store record for number of downloads during its first week of release. And bizarre Pokéstops — like grave sites, for example — are still being discovered. Even Justin Bieber is getting in on the fun.

This week we went to a Pokémon Go meetup in New York City's Union Square. Several hundred people showed up to play together at the gathering, which was hosted by Rick Bross, who's been organizing meetups all over the city. Last week, almost 1,200 people showed up to play in Washington Square Park.

Below, 10 people explain why they're completely obsessed with the game:

Even if you're not playing Pokémon Go, it's easy to spot who is: Just look for the mobs of people looking down at their phones.

To keep players and their phones happy in the 90-degree weather, the Pokémon Go meetup supplied visitors with a free charging station and water.

Union Square is already a popular spot with players, since it's an official Pokéstop.

The meetup team also placed "lures," an item that attracts Pokémon, to the area — and where Pokémon go, people follow.

Enrique, the Pokémon Go meetup's community manager, greeted players as they wandered up.

"I grew up with Pokémon, I still have all my cards and still have all the games from Nintendo Game Boy," Ivan told Business Insider. "I've discovered more neighborhoods and made more friends than ever [while playing]. It's the most awkward situation — you're standing in front of a church, it's the South Bronx, you're looking at somebody standing there just nonchalantly playing on their phone, and you're like 'Pokémon?' and they're like, 'Pokémon.'"

Ridge Porter happened upon the meetup: "I was just coming back from work and saw everybody and just stumbled over to the meetup sign. I've caught about 70 different types of Pokémon, and most of my friends are playing, too."

"I'm a mama's boy, and I call my mom every single day. Last week, my mom called me and was like, 'Reggie, you have not called me in the last three days — what's going on?' and I told her, 'I'm just walking, Ma, it's good.' She's like, 'How much have you been walking?' I looked at my phone and found out I was walking about an average of 13 miles a day" while playing the game, Reggie Gacad said.

"I went to a Pokémon meetup in Central Park, but I couldn't really find anybody because the park is just so huge. You really have to get there when it starts, otherwise [the players] disperse. As we walked through the park, we did see plenty of people playing, albeit they were all guys, but there were still a lot of people," Alex Weinstock said.

"This is my third or fourth Pokémon meetup. I played the video game when I was a kid. I remember when I was little I was at the dentist office and I was reading [a] magazine that they have for kids and they had a thing on Pokémon, and I was like, 'Oh, my God, I need this game,'" Itzel told Business Insider.

We went to a Pokémon Go meetup and found out why everyone is so obsessed with the game