MMTRG (Mobile Multiplayer Trans-Reality Games) is an evolution of MORPG (Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games) fusing the real world with the virtual, digital world via your mobile and GPS. One of these is CitySlikkers and was one of the 10 Android apps I highlighted last week.
CitySlikkers is one of a handful of mobile games that have been devised which integrate the real world with a virtual gaming world via the mobile.
What’s brilliant about CitySlikkers is that…
“…the playing community will always be a minority they hereby form some kind of elitist, secret society which is based on knowledge, but not financial or political power.”
This elitism is the basis on which William Gibson’s ‘Spook Country’ professes to “secrets [being] the very root of cool.”
The game combines elements of strategy, role-playing, sports, social and tactical games, but in contrast to popular MMORPGs (Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games), the outcome of the actions as well as the new connections made between people, will affect normal life as the everyday city is no longer the same due to the players‘ experience.
CitySlikkers looks brilliant, but I’ve been thinking about games alot recently - more on that in future posts - but the lure of mobile and the additional dimension it opens up, is fascinating.
With Apple’s iPhone 2 offering 3G and GPS and Nokia’s N95 and upwards offering the same, being constantly connected and able to be pinpointed on a virtual map via GPS is becoming the norm and with it comes enormous opportunities in changing the game of Gaming.
MMTRG is a blog which documents a list of developers and the games they’ve dreamt up and news surrounding them - It’s worth a read…
Other avenues worth following include location based games, Alternate reality gaming and a couple of games that Blast Theory, based down in Brighton have already evolved:
Uncle Roy All Around You - more info here.
Can You See Me Now
iPerG
Participate
CivilAction - an urban code chase game.
What’s key to the last few examples is that at the heart of the games is storytelling. If the story isn’t convincing enough then people aren’t going to play. If it’s believable though then you’ve got a runaway hit on your hands…As always, making the technology invisible to the player is paramount to success.
