How do you use Sony’s Playstation Portable to play big games? Take advantage of the system’s ability to search for WiFi access points, and make that the basis of a scavenger hunt / puzzle game. At least that’s what Jonas Hielscher did when he created CollecTic, an inventive little title developed as part of Hielscher’s graduation project for the Media Technology masters program at Leiden University. From the man himself:

The objective of the game is to search for different access points, to collect them and to combine them in a puzzle in order to get points. In the game, the player has to move around in her/his local surrounding, using her/his PSP as a sensor device in order to find access points. By doing this, the player is able to discover the hidden infrastructure of wireless network coverage through auditive and visual feedback.

Bonus points go to Hielscher for moving beyond the simple scavenger hunt mechanic, and adding a bit of puzzler to the mix. According to his site, each secured access point is defined by a shape and color, the shape being determined by the manufacturer code of the unique MAC address, and the color determined by the product code of the same. When the player “collects” an access point he/she can then arrange it in a 3×3 square with other access points collected. Matching sets of three (by color, shape, or both), earn the player points.

As if that wasn’t enough, the game allows players to collect unsecured access points as well. Once collected, the unsecured points appear as either black or white stars. If they’re white, they act as “wild cards,” and can be used to complete matching sets. If the point is black, however, it clears the player’s grid, forcing him/her to start over with collecting.

These are small additions, but they can add a great deal to gameplay, as well as make the experience more aesthetically pleasing as a whole (in addition to size, shape and color, each individual access point is defined by unique sound, making for a nearly synaesthetic experience).

Be sure to check out the site, which offers more information on the game’s development, photos, and short videos of the gameplay in action. Although CollecTic is not publicly available yet, Jonas Hielscher promises that it is coming soon, and will be playable on PSP’s up to firmware version 2.0.

»CollecTic via Kotaku.

Appeared originally on Away From Keyboard.

From Milan (and via We-Make-Money-Not-Art), comes a bizarre, but arguably worthwhile big game concept: to make the process of play not only enjoyable, but productive as well. Welcome to Dark Treasure (Tesoro Scuro), the gaming adjunct of a slick little Italian pooper-scooping service known as Pooptopia.

Pooptopia relies on a community of users to identify instances of dog poo in the city of Milan. Once identified, Pooptopia sends out an individual on a moped to scoop the “dog litter,” and dispose of it properly. The system is apparently funded by the city itself, meaning the official scooter scoopers are paid for their work, which is comforting to know.

The gaming portion of this is simplistic: A user aligns him/herself with one of three teams. If a user sees dog poo in Milan, they take a picture of it, and send it to the Pooptopia e-mail address, earning points for their team. Bonus points are promised if the user can identify the area in which the poop was seen (which seems like an important detail to me). A prize is offered to the top “poo-hunter” each week, which makes the team mechanic unnecessary, considering the individual is ultimately credited and rewarded, and not the conglomerate.

While earnest in terms of its concept, Dark Treasure fails to seem enjoyable in the overall, in part because the goals of the entire project seem a little jumbled. Consider that the game is being used as an incentive for members of the community to locate and report instances of “doggy doo;” the creators expect players to want to play a game that is fun, and in playing that game, they will indirectly assist the “Pooptopia” system. The play itself, however, is not really expected to be that rewarding, as evidenced by the fact that the official Pooptopia site pronounces the goal of the game to be the sanitization of Milan, rather than simply the pleasure of playing. So, basically, the game is intended to be an incentive to clean up the city, even though cleaning up the city is intended to be the incentive to play the game. (Huh?)

Still, the notion of productivity through gameplay is interesting and always worth pursuing, and Dark Treasure stands as a unique intersection of the “Serious Games” ideology and “Big Games” execution.