Big Gaming Combines Virtual and Physical Environments

Big Gaming is a promotional phenomenon defined as large-scale, real-world games that typically employ electronics like mobile phones and laptops to combine real-world environments with virtual tools like GPS and mini-games.

Kevin Slavin of area/code specializes in Big Games and shed some light on the marketing device at the psfk trend conference.

One example Slavin showed was ConQwest (for client SSK Qwest), in which 5 teams of 20 high school students each competed to control territory and collect “treasure” hidden throughout a city. The “treasure” was in the form of cell phone readable optical codes called semacodes (see picture above) placed on stickers, posters, billboards, even newspapers and taxi-tops that remained a mystery to only those in on the game*.

Ultimately, Big Gaming’s mantra is that people “who share space should share experiences,” and that games should have computers in them — not the other way around. Slavin concludes that since we are collectively swimming in data,

Another example is Urban Golf, a game that combines a basic golf engine overlayed onto a GPS map of a city. Gamers play 18 holes around the city, having to walk to the location of their ball after every shot

Toys are getting into the virtual + physical thinking as well. Webkinz is a toy that uses unique codes to create a virtual life for stuffed animals, and Disney’s Virtual Kingdom allow theme park visits to unlock experiences online.

[*The game's premise is cleverly based on the John Carpenter sci-fi film, They Live starring Roddy Piper and home to the longest one-on-one fight scene ever.]