My Egress from Ingress

Some of you might have heard of this game called Ingress. Lemme tell you about it, from my biased point of view.

The concept is fascinating, really. Google overlays an MMO over Google Maps. Meaning that in order to move your avatar in the game world, you have to move your smartphone in the real world. "Augmented reality" they call it. They tie places of interest in reality to "portals" in-game. You have to go to those portals and claim them. It's fun. Then you trace lines along these portals, and when you form a triangle it's filled in your faction's color, successfully claiming that turf for your loyal faction.

The game features minimalistic graphics, and gives verbal cues to most actions, so that you may play while you walk. Headphones are suggested on the load screen.

"Hold on, m'homie" you may be wondering. "Do I have to get off my couch for this?" you may ask. Yes. Yes you have. You have to get out there, and if you're serious about it, or if you want your faction's approval, you have to get in your car and spend some serious gas money on it. Now, before you run away, I assure you, the game ties in-game locations to places of interest. So you should be leaving your house to see cool places! Every time you play it's an adventure! At least in theory. In reality you will find most portals are garbage. Somehow Google thought it would be good to let users submit portals in order to mine the data and profit by measuring human traffic... but the result was players who wanted more portals started reporting bus stops, lawn ornaments, signs and such as portals, and Google played along. You will spend your day running from uninteresting location to uninteresting location.

"But it sure is worth it, right?" You may ask next. "Capturing all those portals and claiming the land for your faction sounds satisfying!" Sure. Sure it is. Until some jerk from the other faction shows up and claims them. Portals usually last a day or two. You're not meant to keep them forever. It takes a while to realize Ingress is a plate-spinning game. The idea is to have as many going as possible, not to have them all. This can be extremely frustrating if you're outnumbered, or someone in the opposing faction is targeting you or even cheating.

And boy, is there cheating! It's a well known fact that some players play from their couches, spoofing coordinates in a PC running an Android emulator. Targeting large fields and remote portals. These people never seem to get banned. Google provides a nice "intel" page that players may peruse to plan their trips. Some players, however, use forbidden apps that mine this system for extra information, this allows the cheater to virtually stalk other players and harass them. Of course, if you ask these cheaters, they will say they're just hardcore and insist it's OK to break the rules as long as you don't like them.

But then there's those who don't cheat the game, but still have an unfair advantage, and use it to troll other players. I can think of many examples, but some may come off as whiny, so I'll skip to the worst. There is an actual police officer that actively plays while on duty. Pretty much funding his Ingress addiction with taxpayer dollars. He will use his badge to get to hard-to-reach places and will use his uniform to intimidate others. If that doesn't make you want to flip a table, I don't know what will.

"What about the community?" I'm assuming you asked. Well they're OK. You'll meet fun people, and may even organize fun expeditions. But then there's the stalkers, the faction-switchers, the spies... then there's the roleplayers...

Google has made a point to give the game an RPG feel by adding a "backstory". They gave names to the factions and have even established recurring characters that come up in social media posts. Some players play along and that's fine. I'm a fan of RPGs myself. But this is a game that takes place in real life. And it's freaking scary when people do it as part of their regular lives. Some take the grudge between the factions too far and make threatening posts and such. It creates a very hostile environment.

So basically it's everything I hate about an MMO, without any of the things I like about MMOs. Eventually I got tired of coming home late because I had to spin so many plates on my way. I got tired of blocking the creepy players. I got tired of trash talking. I got tired of reporting fake portals. I got tired of visiting lawn ornaments and road signs. I got tired of the endless notifications. I got tired of being antagonized by fucking Robocop. I own many games that are far better and require far less effort. If you need me, I'll be playing Tetris.