Why not wait until the game was much more polished and had many more traditional Pokemon features before release?
Nobody will be playing this in a month unless Niantic are really really fast with the content updates. Like, one per week fast, until it's much more deep than it currently is.
The game has all the G1 pokemon. I've had friends ask if it had "that modern garbage" before considering installing it, so having just G1 sounds like an excellent pick, it doesn't hinder younger people and recaptures the RGBY generation which didn't keep up with the series.
There's plenty of things to add and improve (including but not limited to the servers) and the rest of the international rollout to complete before there's any reason to expand to Gold and Silver.
- Obviously the servers are slow, but the app freezes and crashes all the time too.
- The help text is unhelpful and leaves the user with a ton of questions as to what the buttons actually do.
- Little to no support for people in rural areas, as the Pokemon follow the XM patterns from Ingress.
- Buggy Pokemon catching (e.g. you have to throw super far to catch Zubat)
- No way to add friends, and very little community interaction (with the exception of gyms and lure modules).
- Can't rename character, change clothing, etc.
- The map on the Pokemon screen loads slower than everything else, so when you go to tap "Transfer" and the map loads it changes the layout and makes you click the app.
It feels more like a buggy beta of Farmville with geocaching than it does a Pokemon game. Pokemon Go is to the classic Pokemon games as Elder Scrolls Online is to the classic Elder Scrolls games -- tons of potential, but severely lacking in execution.
For what it's worth, here in New York City, the community interaction takes place IRL. There are literally hordes of people roaming the parks. Some people set out lures, and then sit on benches, striking up conversations with other players who walk over to try and catch some Pokemon.
I can't imagine how this game would work in rural areas, though.