Now I may be wrong since I have not actually participated/played either of these genres of games, yet. But games fascinate me. And I think I have finally figured out the difference between “Alternate Reality Games” and “Augmented Reality Games” (without consulting Wikipedia, ha). So of course I have to tell you.
An Alternate Reality Game is a game that takes place through/among various media – go to a website, find a location, go to the location, find a phone number, get a scratch card in the mail, figure out the code and go to the website (pardon the random examples). It is called “Alternate Reality” because you are navigating a reality of clues that others aren’t paying attention to because they aren’t in the game. Here is a list of some.
An Augmented Reality Game is a game that takes place through an electronic medium (like an iphone screen, or a GPS, PSP or DS screen) that you carry in the real world (hence Reality) and as you travel to locations in the real world, it generates things on the screen that you interact with that do not physically exist. Hence it’s “Augmented” by an extra layer of reality.
I had a hard time explaining the differences between those things in my head, and finally got it straight – by my reckoning, at least.
What do you think? Sounds fun to me!
A picture is worth a thousand words. A video is worth 25 pictures a second.
Alternate Reality: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LtnOUrV8Jb4
Augmented Reality: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKw_Mp5YkaE