Gbanga blog

Tagged: augmented reality RSS

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  Matthias 15:51 on October 12, 2011 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: art ( 25 ), augmented reality, gameplay ( 40 ), gamification ( 25 ), Gbanga ( 20 ), Gbanga Famiglia ( 83 ), inspiration ( 34 ), new item ( 11 ), player ( 31 ), weekly doodle ( 38 )   

  New location-based game mechanics with Shady Fabrics Factory 

  Today, we are releasing the brand-new Shady Fabrics Factory, one of a series of purchasable items that will change gameplay in Gbanga Famiglia fundamentally. In this blog post, we will explain you why.

  

  A Gbanga Cell with a Shady Fabrics Factory

  The Shady Fabrics Factory is a placeable building that can be installed in Gbanga Cells to increase the number of establishments that are available in the game world.

  You drop a Factory in an empty Cell to build the Shady Fabrics Factory. The existence of the Factory will then trigger the appearance of five Warehouse establishments in the same Cell. The Warehouses initially join your Famiglia. That means you control even more establishments if you know locations that are not densely populated.

  Placeable infrastructures like the Shady Fabrics Factory will change the gameplay fundamentally…

  However, the situation is tricky: other players can take-over the Warehouse establishments; only the Factory establishment itself stays forever in your possession.

  Over the next couple weeks, we will release a number of new items that can be installed in Cells and constantly change the characteristics of a Cell and change the gameplay slightly.

  Players that log in today and tomorrow receive a Shady Fabrics Factory in their Pocket for free. Other players might buy one from the Pocket shop or have to play and accomplish quests in order to receive a Factory.

  Start growing your empire today! We are curious about all the strategies that you are about to develop…

  Visit our forum to find more information and to share strategies.

   

   

   

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  Rafael 19:06 on October 9, 2011 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: augmented reality, casual gaming ( 68 ), e-tourism ( 8 ), gamification ( 25 ), Gbanga ( 20 ), location-based gaming ( 67 ), new audiences ( 39 ), showcases ( 7 ), Zoo   

  Location-based game Gbanga Zooh 2009 revisited 

  This post is part of the showcase series of mixed-reality and location-based game projects, Gbanga has realized over the last 4 years.

  Gbanga had several successful games before mafia-themed Gbanga Famiglia. With more than 4 years of experience in the mixed-reality location-based gaming market, Gbanga has developed some special titles ranging from edutainment titles like Gbanga Zooh through e-tourism applications like Gbanga Ballenberg to a seasonal promotional advent calendar Gbanga Santa. During the next weeks, we’ll be reviewing some of our showcases with you.

  

  Gbanga Zooh: Save the Armur Tiger!

  Gbanga Zooh, the mixed-reality location-based game was designed for the Zurich Zoo and caught people’s attention to endangered animals. Gbanga released (virtual) wild animals all across the city that needed to be saved by the players. The quest was combined with cross media promotion (flyer, posters, website, and newspaper) to reach a maximum of attention.

  Introducing a new game genre and create walk-in customers

  Creating this pioneer gameplay for Gbanga Zooh was superb says Gbanga’s CEO Matthias Sala. “As early as 2009, Gbanga presented a completely novel solution for business where customers interact with brands in a fun and special way with today topics such as mixed-reality, location-based gaming and gamification. Throughout the campaign, Gbanga could virtually export the Zoo experience to the city; alert people outside of the Zoo about ecological and environmental issues and generate walk-in customers.”

  “It’s fun to mix a scavenger hunt and collecting of virtual items” says player FlohEinstein

  Educational fun on J2ME devices

  The educational gameplay was also simple to understand. After the player has downloaded the app onto his phone (the mobile game was running on low-tech feature phones long before smart-phones were popular), he started collecting virtual animals that are located at physical locations all around the city. He then picks them up into its cell phone inventory. In a second phase the player returns the endangered animals to the physical zoo.

  There, the player can trade off the animals for virtual seeds at a virtual zoo desk. The seeds are specific to the habitat of the animal (“orangutan clambers up trees”) and the seeds are the reward for all the work in the first phase. The third goal is to rebuild the wildlife living space of the animals.

  Balanced gameplay through circle of life

  To do so, the player sows plants in the virtual parallel world. If the plants thrive and prosper, the animals from the zoo return (“many trees attract the orangutan”). When abandoned, the created plants rots, the habitat is endangered again and the animals need to be saved by another interested player – the play and biological cycle start again.

  About Gbanga

  Gbanga is the cutting-edge game studio focusing on mixed-reality and location-based gaming beyond check-ins. Since 2007, Gbanga delivers mixed-reality games in Switzerland and around the world. Besides releasing it’s own games, Gbanga investigates new technologies together with innovative partners.

  Client:	Zoo Zürich, APG Affichage
  Campaign	Gbanga Zooh – Save the Amur Tiger!
  Year:	2009
  Concept and Creation:	Gbanga
  Production:	Gbanga
  Platforms:	Symbian, Java Mobile Edition (J2ME)

  For more showcases, visit gbanga.com/showcases.

   
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  Matthias 12:40 on September 17, 2011 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: augmented reality, client project ( 2 ), gameplay ( 40 ), gamification ( 25 ), motion, motion-control, new audiences ( 39 ), transmedia ( 2 ), user interaction, web ( 2 )   

  A browser Flash game with a motion-controller iPhone app 

  This week, the Gbanga team has introduced a new way to interact with websites. Together with Wirz Wietlisbach Dialog, we have created a truely interactive website where visitors can interact with the IKEA site through a motion-sensitive iPhone app.

  

  IKEA PAX Packer game with motion-controlling iPhone app developed by Gbanga

  Here is how all parts work together:

  1. Install the IKEA PAX Packer app on your iPhone
  2. Open http://ikea.ch/PAXpacker in your browser on a notebook or desktop computer
  3. Start throwing the virtual clothes into a wardrobe by doing motion-gestures with your iPhone
  4. And please, rate it high in the app store ;)

  Gbanga contributed the motion-controller app, a real-time communication protocol and a multi-user server-side stub. The folks at Wirz then simply designed a Flash website that receives update messages of the motion-sensitive iPhone app. Thanks to the generic design, it is easy for us to adapt this to other campaigns, too.

  This app is part of a series of exciting Gbanga projects that combine mixed-reality, augmented-reality (IKEA VIEW) and gaming (Pilotifant) with innovative apps and novel technology.

  The motion-sensitive iPhone app has been developed by Gbanga with native tools for iOS. Wirz used Flash to implement the browser game. PAX is the name of IKEA’s wardrobe system.

  About Gbanga

  Gbanga is the cutting-edge game studio focusing on mixed-reality and location-based gaming beyond check-ins. Since 2007, Gbanga delivers mixed-reality games in Switzerland and around the world. Besides releasing it’s own games, Gbanga investigates new technologies together with innovative partners such as Wirz Wietlisbach Dialog.

  Credits

  Client:	IKEA Switzerland
  Campaign	Platz für neue Ideen. Place a de nouvelles idees. Spazio a nuove idee.
  Year:	2011
  Concept and Creation:	Wirz Wietlisbach Dialog
  Production:	Gbanga (only iOS, communication protocol and server-logic)
  Platforms:	iOS

   
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  Matthias 14:14 on August 23, 2011 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: advertising ( 4 ), AR, augmented reality, client project ( 2 ), interactive billboard, PR   

  Interactive billboards with augmented reality app IKEA VIEW 

  Yesterday, IKEA Switzerland launched the “Space for new ideas” campaign to introduce their new catalogue. As part of the campaign, Swiss advertising agency Assai/Wirz has commissioned Gbanga to create the innovative augmented reality app that turns regular billboards on Swiss streets into interactive posters featuring movies. With the IKEA VIEW app for Android and iPhone, the audience can watch a movie on top of the print poster.

  “We’re proud to have implemented the first AR poster for Switzerland”

  There are three different types of posters with interesting motives. Try to find all and snap them with your mobile phone camera to play the fun overlay movie.

  

  Screenshot of IKEA VIEW app

  First augmented reality billboard for Switzerland

  The Gbanga team proud to have pushed the boundaries again, having implemented the first billboard campaign in Switzerland that uses augmented reality as a core feature.

  This campaign shows that augmented reality has arrived in mass market since it is compatible, available and with good performance on most modern smartphones currently popular in the Swiss market.

  IKEA VIEW has been developed by Gbanga with native tools for iOS and Android and with the Unifeye framework.

  About Gbanga

  Gbanga is the cutting-edge game studio focusing on mixed-reality and location-based gaming beyond check-ins. Since 2007, Gbanga delivers mixed-reality games in Switzerland and around the world. Besides releasing it’s own games, Gbanga investigates new technologies together with innovative partners such as Assai/Wirz.

  Credits

  Client:	IKEA Switzerland
  Campaign	Platz für neue Ideen. Place a de nouvelles idees. Spazio a nuove idee.
  Year:	2011
  Concept and Creation:	Wirz/Assai
  Production:	Gbanga
  Platforms:	Android and iOS

   
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  Matthias 09:39 on December 31, 2010 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: augmented reality, check-ins, e-tourism ( 8 ), gamification ( 25 ), html5 ( 3 ), location-based gaming ( 67 ), nominations ( 2 )   

  What we loved in 2010 – what we’re looking forward to in 2011 

  2010 was an exciting year for us at Gbanga: We have published our Gbanga app for the iPhone, introduced Gbanga Famiglia, our first globally available quest running on the Gbanga platform where you compete against other Mafiosos over real-world establishments. Our world-wide user base is constantly growing with 10% weekly growth. Last week, we also have sold our first virtual goods, “Police Megaphones” and “Street-cred Speakers” that help players in succeeding in Gbanga Famiglia. For the advent calendar game Gbanga Nokia Xmas, our players have collected 16’530 phones in only 24 days! And as the first game in the world, we introduced location-based coupons in a game (currently only in Germany in collaboration with COUPIES).

  Quests/events

  For IMI Lucerne, we have created an e-tourism game tour through the open-air museum Ballenberg. We have hosted an incredible number of events this year: Smart Urban Stage, IBM Smarter Cities and i-days in Lucerne.

  Nominations

  Gbanga made it to the finals of the Samsung Bada Developers Challenge and we won a cash prize and a device. Further, our work was nominated in the category “Best Real World Game” for the IMGA International Mobile Game Award, was on the Shortlist of the Best of Swiss Web Award (BoSW), was among the Business Idea 2010 by Internet World Business and nominated as “Newcomer” for the Swiss ICT Award.

  Location, location, location, … games

  We were intrigued by the rise of check-ins (even Facebook participates in the war with Facebook Places) and not too surprised by the check-in fatigue. Check.in and ChatSq are great web-based solutions. Location-based gaming beyond check-ins also became relevant this year: a good example for this is the LBS Mini Getaway campaign in Stockholm and Coke’s TRON LiveCycle. After social gaming, we’re happy to see mobile gaming becoming a huge business: we were addicts of Angry Birds, Fruit Ninja and Cut the Rope.

  Strong Switzerland

  We’re delighted that the Swiss game developers are now backed by the amazing GameCulture programme hosted by the Fedral Art Council ProHelvetia. It’s also nice to see the success of the Orbital app and the innovative fund-raising game Amazivision by our friends at bitforge and the premiere of the new Swiss game studio Games2Be.

  Old industry back

  We’re happy that the “old game industry” is back: Call of Duty: Black Ops set  a new entertainment selling record across all media. The Move and Kinect have been released; indicating that players are willing to move physically. And we congratulate the Marcus Persson to his insane success with the sandbox game Minecraft. We’re curious what Marcus’ new studio will ship in 2011. Also, we like the new approach to place a real story plot into a game like Heavy Rain did.

  Some “Unwort”s in this year

  We have learned a bunch of new words this year: Robert Scoble reported about the new term geo fences which is nothing else than a cell switch in Gbanga. Magazines, blogs and even wikis turned crazy about the idea of turning everything into a game: it’s called gamification, now, again. It describes the use of game play mechanics for non-game applications. The Email Game is a great example of gamification. Twitter Art (or TwArt?) describes tweets that use characters to visualize images. It does not work on all browsers and mobiles thou. We’ll post how to do Twitter Art (and line breaks in Twitter feeds) soon in this blog.

  Other great stuff

  We also were excited about meaning-free lyrics like in Duck Sauce’s Barbra Streisand, impressed by the big bass power of the X-mini.

  Looking forward to 2011

  Besides an all-new Gbanga website (which this blog is part of), a mobile web version, we’re going to add incredible virtual goods and introduce exciting weekly side-quests in 2011.

  We’re impressed by the reappearance of the browser war (this time on mobile) and hope HTML5 will solve it. We’re looking forward to the GDC 2011 in San Francisco where Gbanga is present at Swiss game booth #731. We believe in the ongoing crowd sourcing hype, especially in c-crowd.com.

  It’s awesome, all the Xmas and New Years greeting cards, we have received from our start-up friends and beloved clients. Thanks to Comerge, Doodle, Memonic, Nothing, GIANTS, Tektrooop, VZ, youngculture, AdNovum, IFS Rapperswil, FHNW. See below:

  

  Happy New Year!