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iPhone app Gunman lets you have a shootout w/ friends via augmented reality
- dkokelley 17y agoThere was a similar program for the old Palm Pilots, where you used the IR capabilities to 'shoot' other devices. Unfortunately the other devices had to be pointed at you for it to work. I'm glad to see how far virtual gun battles have come in the 21st century.
- adamhowell 17y agoThis idea could go so many places: extra points for headshots, fleshwounds not counting, additional modes like a Counter-Strike-like Terrorists vs. Counter-Terrorists team battle of capture the flag. Also, imagine a massively multiplayer version of this at a web conference.
- sabat 17y agoThe only problem I have with this idea: why didn't I think of it?
- bjelkeman-again 17y agoNow there is a game which is very close to one I was thinking of myself. There is going to be a lot of this stuff coming, people running around on the streets in their augmented reality world shooting dragons...
- yan 17y agoFace detection algorithms are no longer just for digital cameras. Bones points for shooting someone in the face?
- figital 17y agoMy friends probably aren't very good shots and easy to hit. Can they augment Godzilla in there with some kind of killbot AI? http://affiliatemarketingebook.info/images/pink_goggles.jpg http://affiliatemarketingebook.info/images/pink_goggles.jpg
- andreyf 17y agoIt seems to use shirt color to identify a kill. That seems trivial to hack (both ways).
- pgbovine 17y agosure, but supposedly if you were playing with your friends, then everyone would want to play fair, or else it's no fun :)
- pgbovine 17y agoi'd be afraid of dropping my phone while playing this game ... seems easy to slip out of your hand while you're running around/ducking/tapping furiously on your screen. some sort of wrist strap (like those that come on digital cameras) would help, though
- chrischen 17y agoMaybe some of those cheap attachments like they have for the wii remotes, but instead turns your iPhone into a gun.
- pfarrell 17y agoI've been waiting for someone to implement the game from the movie Gotcha!. Looks like it's been done. Like sabat said, why didn't I have the guts to pursue it.
- chrischen 17y agoIsn't this pretty much laser tag, except using different technology (camera)? So it's innovative, but only in the aspect of being able to do this on the iphone with the hardware it has.
- cracell 17y agoWell all of the laser tag systems I've seen you have to where a vest with sensors on it that detect the enemy lasers. Which really sucks when you shoot someone but miss the sensor or say you go for a head shot and nothing happens.
- timdorr 17y agoHasbro's modern guns integrate the receiver with the gun itself: http://www.ggaub.com/ltag/equipment.html http://www.ggaub.com/ltag/equipment.html I have a pair, as do 3 of my friends. We play games on a weekly basis. It's a hell of a lot of fun, surprisingly intense exercise, and the hardware works really well (I can shoot upwards of 150 feet away).
- scott_s 17y agoIt also doesn't require special guns, no one has to wear bulky sensors which can be covered up, and it can be done on a device that many people carry with them wherever they go. So it's innovative, but only in the aspect of being easier and having a low barrier of entry.
- frankus 17y agoThis is getting uncomfortably close to the project I'm working on. I'd better hurry.
- slig 17y agoIn the video it says that when you hit an enemy, his phones vibrates. How do they do that?
- wallflower 17y agoiPhone of person whose color was just tagged? AudioServicesPlaySystemSound(kSystemSoundID_Vibrate); http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1856538/iphone-sdk-shake-and-vibrate http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1856538/iphone-sdk-shake-...
- slig 17y agoI should've been more specific: How do your iPhone, on which you shot your enemy, send a message to the target's iPhone so that it can vibrate?
- allenbrunson 17y agothe most likely answer would be to use GameKit, which communicates via bluetooth and can be used to discover other phones that are nearby. no wifi connection needed.
- zacharypinter 17y agoOr perhaps their server keeps track of GPS coordinates to know when two online players are in target range of each other?
- allenbrunson 17y agohaving just now read the article, it appears they are using wifi to connect players. bluetooth isn't usable by third-party programs if you've got an original 2g iphone, so they've widened their target market a bit that way. therefore, there's no need for gps. i suspect it wouldn't be accurate enough to do any good, even if you wanted to use it. there's no reason to determine whether a player is in range or not; the program knows which players are in the game from the very beginning. also, i'm guessing that they don't use an internet server to mediate games. there's no real need for one, and eliminating that need means the game is less expensive to maintain.
- tdoggette 17y agoI suspect that this is going to be the Pong of the augmented reality game: the simplest thing that'll be fun forever in endless variations, and something upon which amazing things can be built.
- prob 17y agoI'd thought of doing something like this a while back but there have been other priorities. I was thinking of naming it along the lines of "Phasers to Stun". Features would have included the ability to create a force field around yourself so that phasors/lasers could be deflected or you could launch a logic bomb at you're opponent who would need to solve a puzzle etc before they could continue (although this would breakup the game play). I also liked the idea of having a tracker that would ping, somewhat like the tracker in Aliens (trying to create tension as opponents got closer). You'd also be able play team games (e.g. capture the flag) where you could pickup virtual items but if you got shot, you'd drop your item which other people could then pick up. There were also different roles within a team, someone could be a medic, or a countermeasures specialist who could jam opponent systems etc. The opportunities are endless, where you combine the real with the virtual geo-located world. Anyone for virtual hide and seek ...