Augmented reality games are sweeping the globe, transforming ordinary couch potatoes into intrepid explorers and injecting much needed exercise into the lives of many individuals, yet there seems to be some considerable divide between gamers and non-gamers with regards to safety concerns and trespassing.
Utilizing the GPS function of your cellphone or mobile device, games such as Ingress and the newly released Pokemon Go take you to various hotspots within the community and allow you to perform certain functions — Ingress’ purpose is for people to discover ‘portals’ either uncontrolled or held by an opposing faction, and to then take them over using in-game items called resonators and digital weapons.
Pokemon Go, for those of you who aren’t familiar with it, is based on the card-game and cartoon of the 1990s, yet it too utilizes your phone and takes you to the farthest corners of your community — for the sake of capturing invisible creatures with pokeballs.
On the one hand, now that I have played them myself and know firsthand what sorts of distractions face gamers while focused on the screen of their phone, I can understand where the people who aren’t playing are coming from.
Not only do drivers have to watch out for deer, kids on bikes, jaywalkers and the like, but now they have to keep an eye out for errant gamers too.
But do you remember when the biggest complaint about kids was that they didn’t want to go outside and TV was all they did?
Look on the bright side folks, at least we’re getting exercise now and since I know, from personal experience, you don’t actually have to be that close to your pokemon to catch them either, there really shouldn’t be a lot of trespassing.
That being said, those of us who play games like Ingress and Pokemon Go need to exercise common sense and stay alert to the world around us however, as both games repeatedly state during login or app start-up.
The only thing I would caution, in addition to the need for gamers to be aware of their surroundings, is that if you’re going to play Ingress or Pokemon Go, do it with a friend — it’s safer, and it’s more fun.
All in all, I’m excited for the next generation of games like these.
If you’re like me and a kid-at-heart, maybe you should give them a try.
