I recently have gotten into the game of Ingress. I am currently Level 7, and am looking to be leveled up by mid June for reasons I'll discuss later.
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| Ingress is not a game. |
What is Ingress?
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| Imagine them with lasers |
At a high level, Ingress might be described as "combat geocaching meets capture the flag." Players physically go to various real world locations and click buttons on a smartphone or tablet running iOS or Android. Using virtual in-game equipment, weapons, and other tools, they connect these real world locations to one another to control large areas. Every few hours, the teams are scored according to how much population lives within the areas controlled by their color. The team that has the most population coverage is declared the winner of that game period.
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| Leeroy would be proud. |
Personally, due to the leveling, farming, and effectiveness being primarily a function of time spent rather than any particular skills, I'd say it is more akin to a real world World of Warcraft or other MMORPG. I'll go into more detail about this comparison later, and discuss some of the strategies I've been seeing.
In-game Fiction
Ingress is very much a 21st century game, taking elements from MMORPGs, GPS games, augmented reality experiences, and ARGs (Alternate Reality Games.) The storyline is very much taken from ARGs, as all of the science fiction game elements are presented as "not a game" and "very much real," much like a lot of other ARGs. There's even major real world events featuring actors and such.
The core game concept is that in the wake of the CERN laboratory investigations into the Higgs-Boson particle, a new form of energy was discovered. This energy was given the name "eXotic Matter" or XM, and apparently is intelligent, or possesses intelligence, or is related to intelligence, or something like that. Further analysis showed that it is leaking into our world through portals from another dimension. Curiously these portals are usually found to be at or around specific kinds of places or objects. Public works of art, sculpture, fountains, are the most common site for a portal, alongside such things as postal offices, churches, and more.
Further analysis of these portals, and XM, shows that there are alien beings involved somehow. They have been called the "Shapers," and much is speculated about their motivations. It is this speculation that divides the game into two teams. Upon logging into the game, players are forced to choose whether they wish to join the Enlightened, or the Resistance. The former being interested in furthering humanity through the use of XM and working with the shapers to improve our species. The latter believes the shapers to be invaders, and works to fight against them and to save humanity from peril.
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| AKA green vs blue, or "frogs" vs "smurfs" |
Players from the two teams fight for their goal by using the XM to control the minds of the general populace. By connecting three portals together using portal keys, players create "control field" that influences the thoughts of the people underneath it. This information is represented to player as "mind units" controlled, and the current state of the population, and which minds are controlled by which team, can be seen there.
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| Green/Blue is your favorite color. |
And how do players do all of these fantastic things? Well, apparently, a team working within Google, Inc. discovered that the information-like nature of XM allows it to be controlled by simple software that can be loaded onto mobile phones and tablets. They have also developed a number of digital "tools" that can be used to control these portals. But in good ARG fashion, there's a lot of mysterious stuff happening with the Ninantec folks.
How do you play?
I'm only level 7, so I'm just on the tail end of the leveling experience, but let me give you a run down of the basic actions you'll take in the game, and how it ends up working out strategically and such.
The basics
HACK: The first thing you're going to learn in the game is "hacking." Think of this like the "gather berries" or "chop wood" action of most MMORPGs. You go to a portal of either side, click hack, and get gear. If you hack a portal owned by your team, you get extra gear. If you hack a portal owned by the other team, you get AP (Basically, experience points) that let you level up in addition to a smaller amount of gear.
LINK: The next verb that's going to be of a lot of use to you is "linking." One of the items you'll get when you hack is called a portal key. You can only have one key per portal, but with a portal key, you can send links to that portal from other portals. When you link one portal to another, you'll get AP and you'll make the two portals more resistant to attack. Link three portals in a triangle, and you'll create a control field that scores points for your team and gets you lots of AP. But watch out! Links may not cross other links, so plan carefully.
BUILD: If you ever come upon an unclaimed portal, or a portal that is not "complete," you'll be able to add resonators to that portal. Like portal keys, you get resonators by hacking portals, and each resonator has a particular level. Adding resonators to a portal gives you AP and raises the average level of the portal, which means more gear per hack for yourself and other players. If you add enough resonators such that the portal has all 8, the portal is "complete" and can be linked to/from.
ATTACK: One of the items you'll hack from portals is an XMP Burster. This is your primary weapon in the game, and the interface will show you how to fire. Basically, you walk up to the portal, and hit the fire button, causing a wave of energy to burst out of your current location. As it hits resonators along the way, it damages them, and, if you do enough damage, destroys them. Early on, you won't be able to do too much to other portals, but once you hit about level 4 or 5, you'll find you can start taking down even the most powerful portals. Destroy all the resonators, and you can claim it for your faction! There's also a weapon called an Ultra Strike that does extra damage in a more limited range.
Intermediate play
There's actually quite a bit of things beyond these basic actions, some of which will be hinted at by the interface, some not. Glyph hacking, XMP charging, portal charging, portal modding, and more provide a good sense of "mastery" as you get the hang of the basic game play. I'd go into more detail, but part of the fun is discovering these capabilities yourself and learning about how they work.
One of the most important aspects of the game is playing with others. At first, you may be tempted to play solo, or with a few of your friends, like you might do with geocaching. While that certainly is an option, and the game in no way prevents you from doing it, the game shines best as the social game that it is. In order to maximize the level of portals so that you get the most and best gear out of them, you have to have others help you build the portal. The level of a portal is the average level of all of the resonators attached to it, rounded down. But high level resonators, levels 4 and above, have a limitation on how many a single player can place on a single portal. For example, each player may only place a single level 7 or 8 resonator on a given portal. That means that to get a level 8 portal, you need 8 players to each add a resonator.
As you can imagine, this creates a lot of impetus for teamwork, and players get together to do farming events, building events, and more. New players are anxiously welcomed and helped to level up so that they can participate in what one might call the "end game" content at levels 8 and above.
Advanced play
I've only begun to discover advanced play myself, but it is really interesting. Shard games, anomalies, mega-farms, mega-fields, and more provide opportunities for some really interesting moments in the game. Go play and talk to your team mates to find out more!
My review
As I mentioned, I see the game very much as a sort of "live action" MMO. Unlike geocaching or some other activities, the basic activities in the game require little to no skill, just like an MMO. Click the button at the right time, and you get the reward. Your early capability is defined predominantly by how much time you've put into the game, not how well you wield what you have. However, again much like with an MMO, as you get to higher levels, the strategies and decision making becomes more interesting. You start to think about how to hide portals, how to protect portals, which portals to attack and which to leave alone. There are tactics related to linking and attacking that enable you to develop ever more optimal behavior. Yet, just like an MMO, these things are available, but not necessary, to the gameplay. You can always fall back to the basic of "click button, get gear, make field" and never worry about the more intricate strategies you can master.
That's actually a good thing, when it comes to a game that promotes walking around a lot. It's like they've taken the addictiveness of Candy Crush, but instead of just getting sore thumbs and annoying your Facebook friends with your high score, you're also getting to walk around, discover your city, and hopefully meet new people, as a reward for your gaming activities. It's a light gaming experience that encourages you to do better things for your body and mind, in the real world instead of on a couch.
There are moments when playing the game where the real world drops away a little bit, and by walking, I'm just moving the little character on the cursor, trying to get close enough to the next portal to link it to the one I just left. And then a noise pulls me back out, and I notice that I'm standing next to a beautiful piece of art I never realized was right down the street from where I live.
It's a great experience, and I look forward to discovering more about it.
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