Abstract
This chapter examines the entrance of location-based gaming into the app ecology and their subsequent popularisation and commercialisation. I outline how the ubiquity of smartphones coupled with the digital distribution model of the app ecology grant location-based game designers a near-globally universal platform to reach millions of players around the world, vastly increasing their potential audiences and profitability. But as I demonstrate, despite this shift, location-based gaming apps are yet to move beyond conservative, derivative game designs nor provide their designers with a sustainable business model over the long-term. Through an analysis of the political economy of location-based gaming apps and developers—from Niantic’s Ingress (2013) and Pokemon Go (2016) to Kickstarter-funded games like Zombies, Run! (Six to Start & Naomi Alderman, 2012)—I outline how the affordances, constraints, and imperatives of the app ecology shape location-based games’ design.
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