Rostropovich Posted February 23, 2008 Share Posted February 23, 2008 What is Wherigo and how does it work? Also, how does this work with Geocaches? Quote Link to comment
+MountainRacer Posted February 23, 2008 Share Posted February 23, 2008 Oh man... this is a question I spent all of today finding out, in depth. Basically, it's intended to be a type of GPS game, playable on a GPS-enabled data-network device. Currently the Garmin Colorado and PocketPC are the only devices officially supported, but in the very near future, when the prices go down and development moves forward, you can expect many common PDAs with integrated GPS to be able to play. Essentially, you load the Wherigo player app onto your PDA, download a 'cartridge' (game file) onto it, and go to the cartridge's starting point. From there, as you move, the GPS will monitor where you are, giving you prompts and directions based on your location. For example, in a large public garden, a cartridge could be programmed to tell you about the tulips when you're near the tulip patch, and so forth. Gameplay can get a bit more complex from there, and may include riddles, puzzles, picking up an imaginary 'item' and moving it from one location to the next, etc. The possibilities make it very exciting. The geocaching connection is Groundspeak; they, The Powers That Be, have developed this as the next great GPS game. It's not terribly difficult to integrate a physical aspect to make it an official (listable) geocache, either; for example, upon completion of a cartridge, you could be rewarded with the coordinates to a special cache hidden just for that program, so that you can sign in and trade just like a standard cache. Quote Link to comment
Ranger Fox Posted February 23, 2008 Share Posted February 23, 2008 It doesn't have to be a game, either. For instance, you could create a cartridge at a battleground one of three ways: 1) You could take the player around to the different monuments, providing more information at the places and along the way. 2) You could walk the player through the battle on both sides, taking him/her to where each line of battle was, providing sounds and a lot of historical information. 3) The player could play a character in the battle. The cartridge would tell a story and the player would act it out. For the parts off battleground property, you could place physical caches with objects the player would need to pick up. In order for the player to pick the objects up in the game s/he would have to enter a short keyword found on whatever object. Having tangible objects along the way enhances the experience. For Disney fans, you could create a cartridge that would take you to the most rides in the shortest amount of time. So it's not just about playing a game, either. It's whatever you make out of it. Wherigo is supposed to be that versatile. That's where the excitement of building a cartridge lies--how far one can take this. Wherigo supports some sound files at the moment, but Groundspeak seems interested in integrating at a later time more multimedia formats, including video, into the experience. The end result in years to come could be this: Someone (not a geocacher) could be at a park or in the city and want something to do or something to learn. S/he could check for a cartridge via his/her GPS-enabled cell phone. If there is one for the area, the person could download and play the cartridge. Instant fun or a lesson to be learned. Good job with the rest of the introduction, MountainRacer. Quote Link to comment
+The Ox & Monkey Posted March 1, 2008 Share Posted March 1, 2008 Presumably an expensive piece of kit is needed to take part in the Wherigo caches. I only have a Geko 201. Quote Link to comment
+dogastus Posted March 1, 2008 Share Posted March 1, 2008 Presumably an expensive piece of kit is needed to take part in the Wherigo caches. I only have a Geko 201. It runs fine on my old iPaq H2210 PDA with an external Bluetooth GPS receiver Quote Link to comment
+Team Divi Divi Posted March 4, 2008 Share Posted March 4, 2008 OK I was going to reply to another post in the NE Forum about a demo that was possibly in the works for the philly area. The post was closed so here I am. Looks like an interesting concept. I got a pocket pc I already use for paperless caching and I have a bluetooth transmitter I connect to a garmin handheld. Sounds like I have the tools now to look more into this. Does anyone know of many of these caches that are already published? I gotta look into this more..... Quote Link to comment
Ranger Fox Posted March 4, 2008 Share Posted March 4, 2008 OK I was going to reply to another post in the NE Forum about a demo that was possibly in the works for the philly area. The post was closed so here I am. Looks like an interesting concept. I got a pocket pc I already use for paperless caching and I have a bluetooth transmitter I connect to a garmin handheld. Sounds like I have the tools now to look more into this. Does anyone know of many of these caches that are already published? I gotta look into this more..... MissJenn is currently keeping a bookmark list of all Wherigo geocaches. Currently, there are sixteen on her list. I suspect she'll keep it up to date for a while. You can find the bookmark list at: http://www.geocaching.com/bookmarks/view.a...bb-d15017708e65 You are also a premium member. You could just make a PQ for the cache type. Quote Link to comment
+MountainRacer Posted March 4, 2008 Share Posted March 4, 2008 The advanced search only turns up one Wherigo cache in New Jersey so far, and none any further north or east in the US. Quote Link to comment
Ranger Fox Posted March 4, 2008 Share Posted March 4, 2008 The advanced search only turns up one Wherigo cache in New Jersey so far, and none any further north or east in the US. Exactly. Time to create some. (Someone had to say it!) This is like the creation of geocaching all over again: to clear more than 100 caches, people had to drive to many states and all over creation. Quote Link to comment
+TOSY Posted March 4, 2008 Share Posted March 4, 2008 MissJenn is currently keeping a bookmark list of all Wherigo geocaches. Currently, there are sixteen on her list. I suspect she'll keep it up to date for a while. You can find the bookmark list at: http://www.geocaching.com/bookmarks/view.a...bb-d15017708e65 I'm happy to find my cartridge listed in the bookmark. Thank you MissJenn TOSY Quote Link to comment
+MissJenn Posted March 7, 2008 Share Posted March 7, 2008 Does anyone know of many of these caches that are already published? MissJenn is currently keeping a bookmark list of all Wherigo geocaches. Currently, there are sixteen on her list. I suspect she'll keep it up to date for a while. You can find the bookmark list at:http://www.geocaching.com/bookmarks/view.a...bb-d15017708e65 You are also a premium member. You could just make a PQ for the cache type. Yes, as I have added to the bookamrk description, my list was much more useful when first created a few months ago, when we did not yet have the Wherigo cache type. Now, it is much easier for each of us to search for them using the search engine http://www.geocaching.com/seek/nearest.aspx . You can specify your location that way. I may eventually (soon?) stop maintaing the list. For the moment, it is still a fun endeavor. Maintaining it helps me look at the creative ways geocachers find to incorporate Wherigo. Quote Link to comment
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