Success At Last - wireless GPS Game OK in field

[geos715]

Hi:

The laptopGPS project has been going on for a while. One of it's objectives was to develop a GPS game that can be played on a small laptop (netbook from ASUS EEE). The first version is GC1M6T5 which does not support an attached GPS. The latest interation called "ourtownMP" plays on the netbook and allows the geocacher to use the internet to play the game via a wireless USB modem from Verizon. The game has two components - one is the part that is on the netbook. This part reads lat/lon location from a USB GPS and sends the location and browser response to the server at http://gpsmancer.com. The server does the heavy lifting doing distance/bearing calculations and storing the players step in the multi-stage cache. One nice feature is the ability to recover should the game be interrupted. On the laptop, the entire game is played from a USB flash drive so that the laptop does not have to have the game loaded onto the hard drive. When the game is over, just use the USB flash drive for something else. (Technically, you do have to have a very small driver on the laptop and you have to have serial to USB software for the GPS) In any case the the game has completed its tests and it is time to work on a different game theme for the next installment. I would like to do something along the lines of a ghost story/puzzle in which the geocacher has to solve the mystery of the haunting before the final cache location is given. Technical details about the latest game can be read at http://thomasofneedham.com under LaptopGPS project or at http://gpsmancer.com

Regards, Tom Birchmire

Edited March 12, 2009 by geos715

[+StarBrand]

Sounds a bit like Wherigo stuff.

[geos715]

Sounds a bit like Wherigo stuff.

I wrote a Wherigo or two before I decided I wanted similar platform and gametype that was open hardware and software and could be played on IPhones, netbooks, etc. My buddy is working on an IPhone app to play the game and I'll continue with netbook and Andriod developement. I would much rather write geocaching games than program them. Should there be any interest, I'll let geocaching.com host web sites and I'll write games. Until there is interest from other quarters, I'll host any games people decide to develop using the Marco/Polo design on one of my servers.

Tom B

Edited March 13, 2009 by geos715

[+qlenfg]

Not much of a deal.

 

I checked their service in my area. The modems range in price from free to $100 if you do a 2-year contract, or $100 to $200 outright purchase, with a month-to-month plan. For $40 you get 50 megs a month, or $60 for 5 gigs a month, plus 25 cents for every meg you go over.

 

I can buy a cheap GPS for $100 or less and cache for free. Talk about a no-brainer.

Edited March 13, 2009 by qlenfg

[CoyoteRed]

Not much of a deal.

 

I checked their service in my area. The modems range in price from free to $100 if you do a 2-year contract, or $100 to $200 outright purchase, with a month-to-month plan. For $40 you get 50 megs a month, or $60 for 5 gigs a month, plus 25 cents for every meg you go over.

 

I can buy a cheap GPS for $100 or less and cache for free. Talk about a no-brainer.

I agree. I'd be much more excited if there were developed an open system for developing computer-based, real-world adventures. I like the concept of Wherigo, but don't like the limited platform and proprietary scheme.

 

If it were created in, say, Java so it would run on a java-powered Palm, I've got a bluetooth GPS I've used with TomTom for coordinate input. ...or Wherigo for the iPhone anyone?

[+Too Tall John]

If it were created in, say, Java so it would run on a java-powered Palm, I've got a bluetooth GPS I've used with TomTom for coordinate input.

In a discussion about the Wherigo Player being ported to Palm, Ranger Fox linked to an article announcing that Java would no longer be available for Palm.

If Palms can run Java, that'll be the next device on the docket.

 

However, this article disturbs me.

If you've got it, great, but since last year it is no longer available. Strangely, the link went dead to the article, but I found this one. Oh, and you might want to check this out, CR. Edited March 13, 2009 by Too Tall John

[+qlenfg]

Not much of a deal.

 

I checked their service in my area. The modems range in price from free to $100 if you do a 2-year contract, or $100 to $200 outright purchase, with a month-to-month plan. For $40 you get 50 megs a month, or $60 for 5 gigs a month, plus 25 cents for every meg you go over.

 

I can buy a cheap GPS for $100 or less and cache for free. Talk about a no-brainer.

I agree. I'd be much more excited if there were developed an open system for developing computer-based, real-world adventures. I like the concept of Wherigo, but don't like the limited platform and proprietary scheme.

 

If it were created in, say, Java so it would run on a java-powered Palm, I've got a bluetooth GPS I've used with TomTom for coordinate input. ...or Wherigo for the iPhone anyone?

 

I've done a Wherigo cache, and written a few simple cartridges to see what its about, but its kinda flaky and you really have to play around with it to get it to do what you want without crashing. I'll stick to regular caching.