Immersive gaming

Immersive games, also called Alternate Reality Games (ARGs) take place in the real world using everyday life as a gaming platform. Players work together to solve a puzzle or challenge with the adventure lying in the sense that the game's events could be real. From a marketing perspecitve, it's a great example of social media integration with offline marketing.

The first true ARG was created by Microsoft in 2001 to market the film A.I.: Artificial Intelligence. The game, 'The Beast', seeded a trail of clues across various media channels over 3 months, which players followed to reveal a secret related narrative. With the mantra “this is not a game”, The Beast achieved over 3 million active participants and an online community that was still active for years after the game had ended.

Immersive games can also be simple treasure hunts or day-long action games. Some FMCG brands are creating campaigns that involve aspects of immersive gaming; for example the M&Ms Find Red campaign in Canada that has just finished hid in three Toronto locations and challenged consumers to find him by following clues and using Google Maps Street View.

Chromaroma - turning mundane journeys into a game

Chromaroma is a new immersive game that aims to make your real-life journeys around London more fun by using travel details logged by your Oyster card. It maps visualisations of your journeys around the city online in your account and encouraging competitive gameplay with others.

Brought to our attention by Lounge Trend Hunter Rachel, 23, the real fun lies in joining one of four online teams and accepting missions to earn points, such as visiting a new station. It's similar to becoming mayor of a venue on Foursquare, as when you check in a location enough times your team 'owns' it. Other teams can usurp your ownership by checking in more often.

Chromaroma feeds into the emerging digital trend of turning mundane aspects of daily life (in this case, the commute to work) into a game with digital platforms and 'real life' become increasingly blurred. Another example of this trend is the smart phone application Epic Win that turns your to-do list into a game - you reach new levels as you complete your real-life chores.