Why travel guessing game GeoGuessr is gaining popularity amid the coronavirus pandemic
Why travel guessing game GeoGuessr is gaining popularity amid the coronavirus pandemic
Why travel guessing game GeoGuessr is gaining popularity amid the coronavirus pandemic
By Rhodri Marsden
May 11, 2021
Summary
A computer game could hardly succeed in replicating the luxury experience of a fortnight in the Maldives, but one game in particular has been bestowing its players with a little escapism, sightseeing and global knowledge.
Geo Guessr, a game which places you in a 360º photograph taken somewhere in the world and challenges you to pinpoint where you are on a map, has had a surge in interest in recent months, as talented players build large followings on Twitch and YouTube.
Today, people sampling the game for free are shown photographs from the mapping service Mapillary, but the core of the main, paid-for game is still Google Street View; it lets you pan, zoom and move around looking for clues, whether it's signage, vegetation, architecture, cars or local fashion.
It's a pot luck game: if you're fortunate, you'll be parachuted into a road a few miles from where you happen to live.
As a player, you never truly know if your competitors have another browser window open and are Googling names on street signs to establish that they're in a Transylvanian village, but streaming gamers have no such cheat sheet, and have built up a remarkable knowledge of how the world looks and feels.
"It's about being curious, going into the game's Explorer mode to see how countries are, to gain a little more understanding," he says.
The game's potential as a teaching aid has recently resulted in the launch of an education programme.
The random nature of the game means that you see stark economic differences in the space of a couple of minutes, with Los Angeles mansions followed by thatched shacks in Senegal.
The introduction of a Battle Royale mode to the game, where 10 people compete over several rounds to become the best geographer in town, has largely been responsible for booming interest on Twitch and TikTok.
While Geo Guessr puts efforts into its gameplay, it's the progress of Google's mammoth Street View project which will ultimately expand the scope of the game.
Reference
Marsden, R. (2021, May 10). Why travel guessing game GeoGuessr is gaining popularity amid the coronavirus pandemic. The National. https://www.thenationalnews.com/arts-culture/comment/why-travel-guessing-game-geoguessr-is-gaining-popularity-amid-the-coronavirus-pandemic-1.1219617