For my next gameplay report, I’d like to discuss a game that I’ve been playing on and off for several years. It’s a mobile strategy game that relies on locatoin awareness and augmented reality to make shapes on the actual map.
Game and Platform
The game is called Ingress, and it is made by Niantic. It is played using an iOS or Android App but also supported by web browser-based maps and tasks. You may be familiar with games by this company because they are responsible for the wildly popular Pokemon Go. In fact, a lot of the gameplay features of Pokemon Go were developed based on data and lessons learned with Ingress.
Ingress is set in a complex science-fiction universe that mirrors our own. Upon starting the game, players are required to choose a faction, either the Enlightened (Green), or the Resistance (Blue). There is a detailed backstory about aliens working to influence humankind, and players int he two factions represent ‘agents’ who are either trying to help or hinder the aliens efforts.
The game has been educational for me for a variety of reasons. It involves logic, memorization, math, geography and culture. There are several different elements to the game and players tend to play in different ways.
Gameplay
When actually playing the game with your phone, you see a map of your surrounding area on your phone, but culturally significant landmarks or buildings have been identified as ‘portals.’ These portals are claimed by either faction, or if they are unclaimed, they appear white. In recent years, a third faction, controlled by an AI has started to appear in red.
A quick tutorial shows players how to interact with the portals. When interacting with a portal, there are a few things you can do:
- Hacking –to gain resources
- Deploying — each portal has 8 slots for resonators. Players can add resonators to portals to build them up for their faction.
- Attacking — players have explosive weapons called bursters which can destroy the resonators from other factions.
- Modding — each portal has four slots where players can install shields and other mods that change the behavior of the portals.
- Linking — portals can provide keys to agents. If you have a key to a portal, you can link to it from the portal at your current location, provided it’s within range and not blocked by other links.
- Fielding — when linking to create triangles, a blue or green field is created, depending on the color of your faction. These fields generate points for your faction. Large fields over populated areas are more beneficial for your team, so much of the strategy in the game is based around working with team members to maximize fields over populated areas.
Exploring the Ingress Map at http://ingress.com/intel
Potential Learning Outcomes
Ingress can be helpful for learning about your community. The portals that appear in the game tend to be in public areas like downtown areas and public parks. By exploring the portals, you find parts of your community that you wouldn’t have found otherwise. I’ve discovered parks and recreational areas that I never would have visited if I hadn’t been playing the game. When I am in a new city for a vacation or a conference, I can open the Ingress app to see where the culturally significant places and visit them myself.
Players are encouraged to work with members of their faction as well, so cooperation, strategy, and communication become important. Depending on your goals, you may need to connect with local, regional, or international teammates to develop a strategy. The rival faction also can have an impact as well, so you need to learn good sportsmanship, and even a bit of social engineering.
Connections
Ingress has some traditional video game elements. As an agent, you move up through the levels and gain access to more powerful weapons and equipment. For completing various tasks, you gain badges to put on your profile. These are elements related to behaviorism and motivation, encouraging you to push the limits in your gameplay.
It also relates to constructivism and social-constructivism, because the world of the game is literally built (and destroyed and rebuilt) by the players themselves.
As the game has developed, other aspects have been added. For example, players are able to submit new portals for consideration via the website, and there is a review mechanism that allows players to evaluate portal submission based on specific criteria, emphasizing the cultural importance of sites. By engaging in that aspect of the game, you learn about important places in various communities and also apply critical thinking skills when evaluating each site. Because Niantic now has multiple location-based games, the portals submitted for Ingress may also be used as PokeStops in Pokemon Go or locations in other games they are producing.
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