Augmented reality means the phone shows you the street through its camera with something drawn on top - a figure standing in a doorway, a reconstruction of a building that burned down, an arrow on the pavement. In a city game, the promise is that you see the place as it was, or as the story imagines it.
That promise is real in a handful of cases and thin in most. Here's how to tell which you're looking at.
What AR genuinely adds
Showing what isn't there any more. This is the strongest use by a distance. Standing in an empty square and seeing the building that stood there before the war is something no text description achieves. Museums and heritage organisations use it for exactly this reason.
Scale. A city wall that was three times the height of what remains, a tower that lost its spire. Numbers on a plaque don't land; seeing it does.
Delight for children. A character appearing on the pavement holds an eight-year-old's attention in a way a written clue doesn't.
What AR usually is, in practice
Most games advertising AR are doing something much smaller. A photo overlay you line up with a facade. A cartoon character that appears in the camera view regardless of where you point it. A filter. These are fine, but they aren't augmented reality in any meaningful sense - the digital layer isn't anchored to the real world, it's just drawn on top of whatever the camera sees.
The test is simple: walk two steps sideways. If the overlay stays glued to the building, it's tracking the world. If it moves with your phone, it's a sticker.
The practical costs nobody mentions
Battery. Camera plus location plus rendering is the most demanding thing a phone does. An AR game will drain a battery several times faster than a text-based one. For a two-hour route, that's the difference between finishing and not.
You look at the screen, not the city. The irony of AR outdoors is that it puts a phone between you and the thing you came to see. A game that's AR at every stop has you walking through a beautiful centre watching a video of it.
Sunlight. AR is hardest to see in exactly the conditions you'd want to be outside in. Bright sun makes the overlay nearly invisible.
Device requirements. AR needs a reasonably recent phone. In a group of fifteen, at least one person's phone won't run it well.
Safety. Someone walking through a city looking at a camera view is not looking at traffic. Good designs stop you at a fixed point to use AR rather than while moving.
When AR is worth it and when it isn't
Worth it: one or two moments in a route where something genuinely vanished - a demolished building, a former city wall, a river that was filled in. Used sparingly, it's memorable.
Not worth it: as the mechanic for the whole game. A route where every stop is an AR animation is a phone experience that happens to take place outdoors, and you'd get the same from the sofa.
The honest position is that AR is a good spice and a bad main ingredient. A city game's real mechanic is looking at what's actually in front of you and working something out.
What to check before booking an AR game
Does the overlay track the building or the camera? How many stops actually use AR - one, or all of them? What phone does it need? Does it work in bright sun? And can you play the route without AR if someone's phone can't handle it?
That last question matters most in a group. A game that excludes one person's phone excludes that person.
The alternative: no camera at all
Most city routes work without AR, and the reason is worth stating plainly: the interesting thing is already there. A carved date, an odd inscription, four statues of which one is holding something unexpected. Those need attention, not rendering.
You can see which cities have routes and pick one nearby. The page on how the game works explains what actually happens on the phone during a route.
For several teams playing at once, there's a setup for companies and groups.
Frequently asked questions
What is an augmented reality city game?
A city route where the phone's camera shows digital content anchored to real locations - most usefully, reconstructions of things that no longer exist.
Do you need a special phone?
Real AR needs a reasonably recent device. Simpler overlay effects run on almost anything, which is one clue that they aren't really AR.
Does AR work in daylight?
Poorly in bright sun. Overcast days and shaded streets are much better, which is an awkward constraint for an outdoor activity.
How much battery does AR use?
Considerably more than a normal city game, because camera, location and rendering run together. Bring a power bank.
Is AR better for children?
For a moment or two, yes - it delights them. As the whole game it has them staring at a screen in a park.
Can you play an AR route without using AR?
Some games offer a fallback and some don't. Worth asking, because in any group of fifteen at least one phone won't cope.
In short
AR earns its place when it shows you something that isn't there any more, once or twice in a route. As the whole mechanic it turns a walk into screen time. For what a city route does without a camera, we've written about the puzzle types a city can hold.
Wondering what a route actually involves before you book? Ask through the contact page.