Love geoguessr! Thank you for making it, I am officially addicted.
I think there are lots of interesting things one could do with the gameplay and data. I would classify it as a Game with a Purpose[1], and I wonder if you have considered using the data you gather to answer some interesting questions:
1) Can we re-map the world according to the similarity measure measured by your game rather than the geographic measure? If so, what does the map look like?
2) How much additional information do you get by exploring? (What is the relationship between distance explored and subgame score?) Is there a way to add this as a feature of the game, i.e. require players to "invest" points to explore a larger area?
3) What are the salient features of a landscape that place it geographically? Language on stores/signs, architecture, landscape geography, prominent flora/fauna, type of cars/roads. Can we identify and classify these features?
Having built a few games with a purpose before (e.g. Wikiwarp [2]), I would love to help if I can. I would be happy to contribute to development to get access to your very interesting data!
Thanks, and best of luck!
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_with_a_purpose [2] https://github.com/nsrivast/wikiwarp
In reply to your questions: 1. What do you mean by similarity measure? Currently, the scoring is just done on a tiered basis on geographic distance, though that scale might be worth adjusting
2. Currently, it uses a webview to show the street view, and moving around is disabled because that tended to crash the app. However, now that Google just added street view to its iOS maps api, I'm planning to integrate that
3. Yes, all of those things you listed can help determine where a landscape is. I haven't thought about formally classifying those features, though it could be something worth exploring
Thanks for the feedback! Will reach out to you if I figure out a way you can help with this!
However, now that Google's added street view to their official iOS maps API, I'm planning to integrate that and it may allow features such as moving and zooming.
