Encounter and photograph our amazing wildlife! Explore and learn about our country! All while contributing to open data, getting exercise and having fun!
We live in a beautiful country; rich with wildlife, parks and landmarks. Unfortunately, very few of us are aware of what can be found around us. This year for Govhack 2016, team YAMM have been working on something that we believe will give people a way to truly connect with their surroundings.
Introducing CRITRS. Learn all about wildlife and landmarks around you by playing this stunning Augmented Reality mobile game.
How it works
After a brief tutorial, we place players on a map of their local area based on their geolocation. Using open data, the game knows what suburb the player is in, what animals live in that suburb, any nearby landmarks, and whether or not the player is currently standing in a park.
As the player navigates the real world, there is a chance they will randomly encounter a wild animal in the game.
When a player encounters an animal, they have a chance to capture the animal on camera using Augmented Reality, which overlays the animal on the real world, creating a truly immersive experience.
Once a photo of the animal is captured, it is saved to your encyclopedia, so you can learn more about it in future.
We have built a huge range of landmarks into the game. Including, but not limited to: Vic Maps’ features of interest, Geelong’s trees and libraries, ABC online photo stories, and thousands more across the entire country.
Expansion to mixed reality platforms such as the HoloLens opens up opportunities for greater immersion than handheld augmented reality.
Features
Upload data to the Atlas of Living Australia
We believe in the power of open research, and that’s why we designed a critter submitter feature that allows players to take photos of real wildlife they come across and submit those as sightings to the Atlas of Living Australia.
- Taking a photo of animal encounters adds the animal to your Encyclopedia.
- Animals are categorised by rarity.
- Being in a national park increases the chances of an encounter. By collecting all of the animals in a park, they are able to earn badges.
- Players can use berries to attract native animals in the game.
- Players can purchase berries and merchandise in the in-game store.
The game is available to download on the Google Play store: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.govhack.critrs
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