Walking down the street draws XM to your person, refreshing your health. XM is short for "exotic material," and it shows up on your smartphone screen as a series of glowing blue dots on the street. Linking three portals together creates a "field," which is more powerful than a portal, and is apparently essential for world domination.Īll this hoofing around hacking portals is hard work, and Google makes you pay for it with something called XM. Portal keys allow you to link portals together resonators power them up and can protect them from being stolen from your rivals. Hacking portals rewards you with various items, the most important of which are portal keys and resonators. To control portals you have to "hack" them, which is akin to a check-in on Facebook or Foursquare. Around town you will find various "portals" the point of Ingress (at least so far) is to control them. Quickly it introduces you to its quirky lexicon. Ingress begins with a series of training missions designed to orient new players. I downloaded the app and wandered onto the streets of San Francisco looking for some adventure. The game is currently in a closed beta, but I got an early access code from Google. With a similar spirit of exploration, I set out today to give Ingress a whirl. In my use, it's been a fun way of exploring new cities and unfamiliar neighborhoods. Released in September, Field Trip sends notifications to a smartphone whenever a person passes an area of possible interest - a landmark, a park, a highly rated restaurant.
Niantic's first project was Field Trip, an Android app for discovering the world around you. Niantic is run by John Hanke, the former head of product management for Google's "Geo" division, which includes Maps, Earth and Local, among other divisions. It is the second product from Niantic Labs, a startup accelerator within Google.
The game takes the form of a free mobile app, now available on the Google Play store for Android devices. As of today, we know the answer: the Niantic Project is a game called Ingress.Īs described in a teaser video, Ingress describes a world in which two shadowy sides are vying for dominance: the Enlightened, who are trying to establish portals around the world that will let them control people's minds, and the Resistance, who are trying to stop them. "What is the Niantic Project?" asked a teaser video. Last week we began to see the first hints of Google's first foray into so-called "alternate reality gaming," in which cryptic clues are strewn about the on- and offline worlds for the perusal of highly engaged fans.