Location-based Games Research Articles

Gamification of walking in nature: A field experiment with Pokémon GO Routes

There are numerous benefits from regularly walking in nature, and today's mobile technologies have the potential to encourage people to do so. Past research has showed that gamified map-based apps and location-based games (LBGs) have the capability to incentivize people to go to nature areas in cities and beyond. In this study, we explored LBGs' potential to bring people to nature by conducting a field experiment with a new mechanic called Routes in the popular LBG Pokémon GO. Prior to the Route feature's launch, we created altogether 13 Routes of various lengths in both city and nature landscapes. We collected numerical in-game data of how many times each Route was walked and deployed a survey (n=67) for Pokémon GO players in the area where the Routes were made. The findings suggest that proximity to population concentrations and in-game rewards are key drivers of Route popularity. Players' motivators to choose nature Routes over urban Routes were limited to outside-the-game factors such as scenery, and overall in our experiment the urban Routes turned out to be more popular.

Navigating Academic Horizons: The Role of Location-Based Games in Multidisciplinary University Transition

The study focuses on the development and evaluation of a location-based game called CMU Journey, which is aimed at helping first-year students become acquainted with their new university setting during the phase of transition. The study’s three primary goals are to: (1) create a location-based game to improve knowledge acquisition related to university transition for freshmen; (2) evaluate the performance of the developed location-based game in supporting knowledge acquisition relevant to university transition; and (3) explore students’ experiences and perspectives with the location-based game designed for university transition. Using a mixed-methods approach, the study collects quantitative data through pre-post measures as well as qualitative data synthesis using an online open-ended questionnaire. Participants in the study are from Chiang Mai University’s Humanities and Social Sciences (N = 434), Technology and Science (N = 341), and Medical and Health (N = 256) programs. The findings show that students who finished the program learned considerable information about starting university, had a favorable attitude regarding studying due to the location-based game, and experienced motivation. An examination of both quantitative data from surveys and qualitative feedback from utilized data found a mix of both positive and negative comments from users. The results presented indicate the potential of location-based games as a beneficial tool for assisting with university transition, along with opportunities for future game design and implementation improvements.

Game-design Workshops with Co-creation Toolkit to Support Game-based Learning for Heritage Museum

In the context of heritage museums, the integration of game-based learning and gamification has garnered significant interest from academia and educational stakeholders. However, barriers such as high costs and lengthy development cycles hinder wider adoption of game-based learning, particularly among educators who lack of software development skills. This paper introduces a series of game design workshops supported by a card-based toolkit aimed at simplifying the process of creating location-based games. These workshops serve a dual purpose: providing educators and museum stakeholders with an accessible toolkit for data collection and offering engaging game-based learning activities for young museum visitors aged 15-30. To achieve this goal, a pilot study was conducted in collaboration with the Guangzhou Maritime Museum, focusing on 48 university students aged 18-26 and 10 museum staff members visiting the Sea God Temple, a heritage site with a 1400-year history. Qualitative and quantitative data collected from this study indicated positive feedback on the value of a co-creation toolkit acting as the instructional scaffolding to support informal learning. Insights gained from this research informed the refinement of the toolkit design, while the game ideas from workshops served as a foundation for mobile game development tailored to young museum visitors.

Using a location-based game to collect preference information for urban and rural forest planning

Location-based games provide an opportunity to collect crowdsourced, spatially explicit data that can be used in decision-making processes in forest planning. While these games have been more widely used in collecting mapping and modelling data, there is limited research on their suitability for collecting location-based data on human preferences, opinions, and emotions in these contexts. Collecting human-centred data can be resource-intensive and costly, hence exploring the potential of location-based games is important. This study investigates the use of geocaching in gathering meaningful data in urban and rural settings. A methodology was developed wherein surveys were embedded in geocaches on trails located in urban and rural forests in Finland. These surveys collected quantitative, qualitative, and photographic data relating to human-forest relationships and landscape preferences. The findings indicate that trails closer to urban areas with higher population density showed increased cache log volume and survey response rates. Moreover, trails tended to collect most information in the first summer after establishment. It is recommended that future studies employing this methodology create shorter, easily accessible, circular trails and that survey questions should be clear and incorporate a method to verify that submitted responses reflect experiences at the chosen location. Furthermore, forest planning professionals and researchers seeking to utilise location-based games in data collection are advised to engage with the communities active in playing them to ensure success..

In-service school teachers’ evaluation of YOUth Go, a platform for easily creating educational location-based games that require players’ physical activity

In-service school teachers’ evaluation of YOUth Go, a platform for easily creating educational location-based games that require players’ physical activity

Mobile AR Interaction Design Patterns for Storytelling in Cultural Heritage: A Systematic Review

The recent advancements in mobile technologies have enabled the widespread adoption of augmented reality (AR) to enrich cultural heritage (CH) digital experiences. Mobile AR leverages visual recognition capabilities and sensor data to superimpose digital elements into the user’s view of their surroundings. The pervasive nature of AR serves several purposes in CH: visitor guidance, 3D reconstruction, educational experiences, and mobile location-based games. While most literature reviews on AR in CH focus on technological aspects such as tracking algorithms and software frameworks, there has been little exploration of the expressive affordances of AR for the delivery of meaningful interactions. This paper (based on the PRISMA guidelines) considers 64 selected publications, published from 2016 to 2023, that present mobile AR applications in CH, with the aim of identifying and analyzing the (mobile) AR (interaction) design patterns that have so far been discussed sporadically in the literature. We identify sixteen (16) main UX design patterns, as well as eight (8) patterns with a single occurrence in the paper corpus, that have been employed—sometimes in combination—to address recurring design problems or contexts, e.g., user navigation, representing the past, uncovering hidden elements, etc. We analyze each AR design pattern by providing a title, a working definition, principal use cases, and abstract illustrations that indicate the main concept and its workings (where applicable) and explanation with respect to examples from the paper corpus. We discuss the AR design patterns in terms of a few broader design and development concerns, including the AR recognition approach, content production and development requirements, and affordances for storytelling, as well as possible contexts and experiences, including indoor/outdoor settings, location-based experiences, mobile guides, and mobile games. We envisage that this work will thoroughly inform AR designers and developers abot the current state of the art and the possibilities and affordances of mobile AR design patterns with respect to particular CH contexts.

Enhancing Environmental Education Through Location-Based Games (LBGs) in Biology Education

In recent years, location-based games have emerged as a potent tool for enhancing environmental awareness within the scope of biology education. This study examines the application of location-based games in biology education to foster environmental consciousness. The research investigates how these games support students' environmental awareness, motivation, and learning processes. It was observed that students' interest in and understanding of environmental issues increased through engagement with location-based games. These games offer students opportunities to practice and develop solutions for real-world problems, thereby promoting active learning in biology education. The findings suggest that location-based games can strategically enhance environmental education in biology by fostering a more profound connection between students and their surroundings. Additionally, the study reveals that this approach positively affects student achievement and their capacity to think critically about the environment. The integration of location-based games into biology curricula is recommended as a means to enrich learning experiences and to assist in developing essential skills for environmental stewardship. Overall, the study underscores the value of incorporating innovative game-based learning strategies to cultivate environmental literacy and engagement among students.

Augmented future: tracing the trajectory of location-based augmented reality gaming for the next ten years.

Location-based games are a highly technology-dependent game genre that has witnessed an exponential increase in popularity with the democratisation of smartphones as well as ubiquitous mobile data and access to satellite navigation. Moving forward into the future, location-based games can be expected to evolve as the technologies underlying the genre improve. In this conceptual work, we review the current state of the art in location-based games, and identify key trajectories and trends. We discovered 12 trends, based on which we jump ten years into the future and evaluate how current technology trends may end up influencing location-based gaming. For example, we propose that in the year 2035 through improvements in map data services and sensor data coverage, we will see locative games that are increasingly connected to elements in the physical world. We also expect to see gameplay that moves away from solely taking place on a smartphone screen to the adoption of multiple forms of interactions with location-based game worlds, especially as head-mounted displays and other wearables become more commonplace.

The player traits and gratifications of casual and hardcore players in Harry Potter: Wizards Unite, Ingress, and Pokémon GO

ABSTRACT Location-based games (LBG) impose virtual spaces on top of physical locations. Studies have explored LBG from various perspectives. In this paper, we leverage several of the most popular LBG (circa 2019) to identify the players of such games: their traits, gratifications, and links therein. To achieve our objective, we deployed surveys to 2390 active LBG players utilising Tondello et al.'s Player Traits Model and Scale of Game Playing Preferences and Hamari's scale of LBG gratifications. Our findings (1) illustrate an association between player satisfaction and social aspects of the studied games, (2) illustrate how the core loops of the studied games impact the expressed gratifications and the affine traits of players, and most centrally, (3) indicate a vital distinction between hardcore and casual players based on both traits and gratifications. Overall, our findings elucidate the players of LBG, their traits, and the gratifications they derive from playing LBGs.

Pokémon GO as an Advertising Platform: The Case for Locative Advertising in Location-based Games

Traditional location-based advertising (LBA), such as billboards and signage, has long been a staple of direct-to-consumer advertising. In recent years, however, the prominence and popularity of location-based games have made digital LBA even more appealing. This article draws on an original research project devised to explore a notable gap in the literature on locative media: the impacts of LBA on small businesses in the location-based game Pokémon GO . The project was conducted between August and October 2021, employing semi-structured interviews with 35 businesses leveraging Niantic’s sponsored location LBA. Our findings indicate that (1) participant businesses found location-based game advertising to be rewarding, (2) LGA can act as an amenity offered by the business, and (3) local community is an essential factor for success in location-based game advertising. In sum, this research demonstrates that local businesses could successfully utilize LGBs like Pokémon GO to advertise themselves.

Citizen Participation, Digital Agency, and Urban Development

Today’s exponential advancement of information and communication technologies is reconfiguring participatory urban development practices. The use of digital technology implies new forms of decentralised governance, collaborative knowledge production, and social activism. The digital transformation has the potential to overcome shortcomings in citizen participation, make participatory processes more deliberative, and enable collaborative approaches for making cities. While digital tools such as digital mapping, e-participation platforms, location-based games, and social media offer new opportunities for the various actors and may act as a catalyst for renegotiating urban space and collective goods, digitalisation can also perpetuate or even attenuate existing inequalities and exclusion. This editorial introduces the thematic issue “Citizen Participation, Digital Agency, and Urban Development” which focuses on the trajectories and (dis)continuities of citizen participation through digitalisation and elaborates this with examples from Europe and Asia on how the digital transformation impacts, challenges, or reproduces hegemonic power relations in urban development.

Delving into the impact of location-based games on high school students: Foro Italico vs. The Siege

This study presents the research results of the implementation of two location-based educational games in the field of history and cultural heritage, created on Taleblazer to be played by high-school students on smartphones. The games were designed to take place in the city of Rhodes island and were titled: “The Siege of Rhodes by Muhammad the Conqueror (1480 p.C.)”, briefly hereafter, The Siege and “Let’s Discover the Secrets of Foro Italico”, briefly hereafter, Foro. By applying to each of them a different design strategy (gamification versus narrative-driven plot), the prime aim was to understand which features were preferred by different age groups, but also which other, external parameters influenced the reception of the games. The overarching pedagogical basis under which this research was placed brought together a series of theoretical approaches that cross-fertilised each other: The game-based learning, Cognitive Theory of Multimedia Learning, Situated learning in combination with approaches that highlight the importance of augmented reality and location–based (digital) games to improve the learning outcome. The research sample was 58 students, aged 12-18, who participated in both games, and the methodological tool was a questionnaire, distributed to the participants after the completion of both games. The processing and analysis of the data was done in the program SPSS. The games were created in the context of previous research, with the aim of verifying or differentiating from already recorded results. This research largely confirmed previous research results but also enriched the existing conclusions with new ones, regarding the importance of the age group and previous experience of the participants, as most of the experiments so far did not provide sufficient statistics of quantitative data. Although the learning performance was not we verified, the additional findings could prove useful in the future for a more tailored design of similar educational games, in order to optimise the learning process, taking into account factors that influence game reception. However, the need for a larger sample size and for further investigation of how games function as learning resources is undeniable.

Estimating Hidden Markov Models (HMMs) of the cognitive process in strategic thinking using eye-tracking

Hidden Markov Models (HMMs) are used to study language, sleep, macroeconomic states, and other processes that reflect probabilistic transitions between states that can't be observed directly. This paper applies HMMs to data from location-based game theory experiments. In these location games, players choose a pixel location from an image. These players either have a common goal (choose a matching location), or competing goals, to mismatch (hide) or match (seek) in hider-seeker games. We use eye-tracking to record where players look throughout the experimental decision. Each location's numerical salience is predicted using an accurate, specialized vision science-based neural network [the Saliency Attentive Model (SAM)]. The HMM shows the pattern of transitioning from hidden states corresponding to either high or low-salience locations, combining the eye-tracking and salience data. The transitions vary based on the player's strategic goal. For example, hiders transition more often to low-salience states than seekers do. The estimated HMM is then used to do two useful things. First, a continuous-time HMM (cHMM) predicts the salience level of each player's looking over several seconds. The cHMM can then be used to predict what would happen if the same process was truncated by time pressure: This calculation makes a specific numerical prediction about how often seekers will win, and it predicts an increase in win rate but underestimates the size of the change. Second, a discrete-time HMM (dHMM) can be used to infer levels of strategic thinking from high-to-low salience eye-tracking transitions. The resulting estimates are more plausible than some maximum-likelihood models, which underestimate strategic sophistication in these games. Other applications of HMM in experimental economics are suggested.

Towards Greater Inclusion and Accessibility for Physically Disabled Players in Location-Based Games

Most research on Location-Based Games (LBGs) has been conducted on non-disabled players, meaning the experiences of disabled players are not well understood and potentially overlooked. As such, this research aimed to address the following questions: 1). What are the barriers and needs of disabled LBGs players? 2). How can LBGs be made more inclusive and accessible? To address these questions, two studies were conducted in the form of an online qualitative questionnaire and a series of co-design workshops. Results articulate the needs, barriers, and desired features of 60 participants. Based on our findings and through the collaborative work with disabled players we articulate 4 guidelines for game designers and developers aimed at improving the accessibility of LBGs: 1) Adding avatar features that better represent disabled characteristics, 2). Providing different input options for phone interactions, 3) Allowing for disabled specific accounts and 4) Introducing a messenger feature to LBGs.

How Location-Based Games Incentivize Moving About: A Study in the Context of Nature-Going

Location-based multiplayer games such as Pokémon GO are tied to real-world locations. Past research has demonstrated that, consequently, these games influence where players move. In order to explore what dynamics in these games incentivize travel to specific places or areas, we engaged in interviews with active players. We discovered 11 unique game dynamics, which could be positioned under three overarching themes: (1) the playing field, as determined by the placement of points of interest, the players' habitat and their surroundings; (2) the player communities and real life relationships, which motivated and directed the playing; and (3) coincidental motivational support, which highlighted how location-based games offer multi-layered motivation for players to travel to, and engage with, specific real-world locations. Our study contributes to the fields of gamified human mobility and human-nature interaction by elucidating how playful technologies can influence where and when people move.

Combining Cultural Heritage and Gaming Experiences: Enhancing Location-Based Games for Generation Z

Location-based games (LBGs) are an effective tool to enhance engagement in cultural heritage experiences. Especially for digital natives (i.e., Generation Z), LBGs are a new way to experience cultural heritage. However, combining the heterogeneous experiences of cultural heritage and gaming without losing control of the game is a challenge for LBG development. This qualitative study proposes a model for combining cultural heritage experiences and gaming in LBGs based on the experiences of Generation Z. Fifteen research participants were asked to play-test the LBG Jungdong Milseo, and the findings were derived through the methodology of the constructivist grounded theory. The study focused on two research questions: “How can the heterogeneous experiences of cultural heritage and gaming be combined in LBG?” and “How does Generation Z perceive cultural heritage experiences through LBG?” The findings revealed that Generation Z wanted LBGs to include historical and cultural information that can only be experienced through games. This study, which combines cultural heritage experiences and games in LBG based on the experiences of Generation Z, proposes a model centered on the elements of site-based play, loose story, and mutually pervasive environment, and is expected to serve as a practical guide for LBG development.

A Comparative Analysis of Low or No-Code Authoring Tools for Location-Based Games

This article presents a comparative analysis of four low or no-code location-based game (LBG) authoring tools, namely Taleblazer, Aris, Actionbound, and Locatify. Each tool is examined in detail, with an emphasis on the functions and capabilities it provides for the development of LBGs. The article builds on the history and purpose of LBGs, their characteristics, as well as basic concepts and previous applications, placing emphasis both on the technological and pedagogical dimensions of these games. The evaluation of the tools is based on certain criteria, or metrics, recorded in the literature and empirical data collected through the development of prototype games for each tool. The tools are comparatively analyzed in terms of the LBG’s constituent features they incorporate, the fundamental and additional functionality provided to the developer, as well as the existence or absence of features that captivate players in the game experience. Moreover, feedback is provided based on the practical use of the platforms for developing LBGs in order to support prospective developers in making an informed choice of an LBG platform for implementing a specific game. The games were created by taking advantage of as many features of the tools as possible in order to have a more fair and complete evaluation. This study aims to highlight the affordances and limitations of the investigated low or no-code LBG authoring tools, enabling anyone interested in developing an LBG to choose the most appropriate tool taking into account their needs and technological background or designing their own LBG authoring tools.

Match Our Cities: Cross-Location-Based Games to Enable Simultaneous Multiplayer

Location-based games have become a worldwide phenomenon, but their multiplayer options typically are either superficial or force players to play together only locally. We introduce a system that compares game areas around the globe and matches points of interest onto each other, allowing for simultaneous gameplay across city or country borders. Thereby, we achieve game areas with an equal representation of their point of interest structure, allowing for fair and equal starting conditions. Our approach procedurally generates content based on factors such as spatial relation and cultural relevance for multiple players. Each generated game area can be adapted in size, orientation, and cultural location selection criteria to provide a level playing field for players with different mobility patterns or areas with different sociocultural conditions. The content creation process utilized publicly available OpenStreetMap data and achieves comparable results of high quality even in suburban or rural areas, where a lower content density in today's location-based games is found.

The Impacts of Covid-19 on Players of Pokémon GO

Since its creation, the Location-Based Game (LBG), Pokémon GO , has been embraced by a community of fans across the world. Due to its recency, the impact of COVID-19 on the community of Pokémon GO players is underexplored. We address how COVID-19 has impacted the players of Pokémon GO by building upon existing work focusing on player gratifications and impacts in Pokémon GO . Through semi-structured interviews, we provide a snapshot of the state of LBG play during unprecedented times. These player interviews demonstrate (1) the importance of in-person socialization to LBG, (2) additional ways players use the game as a coping mechanism, and (3) how intentionality mediates player perceptions of people-place relationships. Furthermore, we explore how Niantic influenced these behaviors through changes to how players interact with points of interest and engage with elder game mechanics such as raiding.

The effect of a location-based game for university transition: Comparing learning outcomes and intrinsic motivation of students in different disciplines

The effect of a location-based game for university transition: Comparing learning outcomes and intrinsic motivation of students in different disciplines