The funny thing is I was in a restaurant last night and passed by two college age kids that couldn't have looked more "bro gamer" and the one guy is playing Pokemon Go on his phone. 

No. Pokemon was a global phenomenon before pokemon go. This app has has just bought it back into the eyes of the general public.

The more bluntly answer the OP ... the answer is probably no, but Sony/MS shouldn't feel bad about that.

Say what you want about Nintendo, but they are simply very good at occasionally (usually once per decade) hitting pay dirt on some kind of out-of-the-blue phenomenon that attracts a very huge mass audience.

They've been doing it since 1983.

bunchanumbers said:
Nope. Taking over the world like this is a Nintendo thing. The twins can't do it because it requires appealing to everyone and being willing to take a risk.

You said they can't do it without taking a risk implying Pokemon Go is a risk. Its not. As I said already, Nintendo has taken risks but this is not one.

I also think Sony takes far more risks than Nintendo especially in the current decade.

Any company can. Things that go viral tend to be unpredictable.

See lol! It is not hard to understand at all. Not saying other things are not big but as big as those things I mentioned...not many come to mind.

There is no answer to this. Pokemon is a popular IP, but its popularity comes through the anime and games not just the games. If Sony and MS were to make sitcoms and movie franchises of their iconic gaming franchises they would be a lot bigger.

But its more than this. Pokemon Go is a free app on platforms that everybody owns. All the big Sony and MS franchises have never tried this, they are $60 games on platforms that only gamers own. Not all gamers, as they play on a variety of platforms. If they were free apps on phones, maybe they could be a hit.

Pokemon Go has gone viral due to a number of factors including being viral which brings curious people to try it because everyone else is doing it. So if Sony and MS did make something like this with their current IP's would it be such a hit? Who knows, if Angry Birds and Candy Crush can do it anything can.

But can it do it at all? More likely, if they specifically made an IP to be this big it would be more likely since their current IP's are more suited to home consoles than smartphones, but they will have to spread beyond gaming to bring non gamers which can be done, and both would complement each other to raise the popularity of one another.

Also, GTA V is way bigger than Pokemon. The paid Pokemon games sell 15 million, GTA V has sold 65 million units. If it was a free app on smartphones it could have done more. If the series gets a new free game on smartphone who knows, it could be even bigger than Pokemon Go.

People need to spend more money with GTA than Pokemon, they need to purchase a console and the game, while Pokemon Go is a free game and 99.9% of the people already have a Phone to play it. Pokemon also have dozens of Movies and a Anime series with 900-950 Episodes (with even more episodes than One Piece, Dragon Ball, Naruto) GTA is a gaming franchise and they never tryed to be anything more than this, they don't even need because they are the biggest third party Ip of the gaming industry.

And I don't understand this thing "As Soundwave said, cultural phenomenons are things that transcend beyond their traditional bounds within their subjects. " 

How do you know that it has "transcended beyond their traditional bounds within their subjects " the Pokemon games already have more than a Dozen of millions of people per  game, GTA also have multiple dozens of players, only because now we see that people are playing this means that the game "transcended" ? So if more people play GTA than Pokemon, and we don't see it, this means that GTA isn't a cultural phenomenon ? We don't  have how to know if the ones playing Pokemon Go were not gamers before the game came out. Pokemon Go is a Mobile game on a Market that is very big and have a very successful series.

Pokemon's subjects are: Gaming, Anime, Movies, Merchandise (toys etc).

GTA's subjects are: Gaming.

Which one do you think that, with a free to play mobile game, would have bigger worldwide appeal for casual mobile games (and also fans)  ?

I think many people have given you examples, this game has caused hysteria around the world. People getting outside just to use the app walking for miles, talking to complete strangers about their experience. Businesses trying to capitalize on the craze by wanting their stores to be listed as Pokestops. Mainstream media talking about it, not in a gaming aspect, but from the sheer firestorm it has created instantaneously. People who don't usually discuss games talking about it at work...

These are all things that classify it as a cultural phenomenon, harkening back to stuff like Cabbage patch kids, beanie babies and Wii... Minecraft is big but has never been on this scale of wide spread reaching out beyond its classification of entertainment. 

Two very different markets. 

Mom/sister/30 year with kids ain't likely playing Grand Theft Auto even if you paid them to. Nintendo's IP do have the upside of being accepted by a far wider audience because they are family friendly.

There are pros/cons to both approaches, having a game center around sensationalistic violence can create "street cred" with male gamers particularily age 12-35 and can create a huge audience within that group, however the flipside of that coin is you likely alienate pretty much any other potential audience. 

GTA is its own phenemonon for sure, but it will never have the reach Nintendo can have *when* Nintendo hits pay dirt with something. Though it isn't something Nintendo can even do on cue. 

For every Pokemon or Pokemon Go, there's a Pikmin or Nintendoland that failed to be able to connect in the way Nintendo was banking on.