5 outdoor team game apps for 2015 to engage your attendees – gamification made easy

Outdoor scavenger or treasure hunt, team building game or quiz – gamification can be just a fun break in an event or a useful tool to enhance attendee engagement. Connecting games with your event’s main subject can heighten the impact it aims to deliver. 

Whether it’s fundraising, charity or product launch, well-constructed games make people truly feel like part of the occasion.

Creating a meaningful game, running it smoothly and, most important of all, wrapping it up can take lot of effort to organize. Good old paper-pencil and, if outdoors, compass and gps (and perhaps users’ smartphones to snap photos) make conducting games a lengthy process.

Creating games online and operating them on smart devices makes the process more flexible. Depending on the app used, you can easily change the date, location and details of the content. Many attendees use smartphones and tablets during the event anyway so the need for special props can often be eliminated.

You just need an online platform to create a game, set up its details and app in player’s devices to run the game and let them have fun.

Benefits from including game apps in event

– easy to set up game for different clients’ events

– less hassle: no paper distribution, setting up game track physically, counting up results

– possibility to engage multimedia – images, videos

– option to build games that spark discussions, actions and interactions among attendees in real life

– enforce main theme, facts, core idea of event through gamification

Many apps have GPS check-in, directions, maps, compass, images, videos, quizzes, missions, tournaments, QR codes, report on team results and a view of real time live players progress. Multiple functions can really spark your creativity to create fun, mobile app-based adventures.

We hope this list of game creation platforms/apps will help you choose the best tool to suit your team game making needs.

1. LOQUIZ

… enables you to create different types of questions, and use them in many types of games. It is possible to create simple quizzes, clue games and outdoor photo hunts but Loquiz works best for gps-enabled location-based games. Loquiz offers a special game concept – an adventurous strategy game type that resembles the “Snakes and Ladders” board game but in active real life. With “jump forward” “and “take two steps back” twists, it allows team members to connect and devise cooperative strategies for winning the game.

2. Actionbound

…allows you to create games, so called “bounds” that can be private or public. There are already various public bounds available to play before you create your own.  Games can be just for fun or informative. The principle is similar to a classical scavenger hunt or geocaching.

3. Mapdash

…also has custom design tools and diverse game types. Mapdash encourages people to discover locations, take (photo) challenges, or answer trivia questions. With leaderboards and event photo streams, all attendees can participate or follow along.

4. Scavify

… is an easily set-up game that gives you an organized list of tasks that informs each player what is left to complete on their list. Scavify also offers a variety of question types and is handy for devising a scavenger hunt.

5. Goose Chase Adventures

…works well if you want to create scavenger hunts aimed at photo-taking and social sharing.  The main idea is to send participants outside to photograph various situations and objects around town. No specific locations on the map can be pointed out. With odd tasks like „Find a statue of an dog, act it out as if you are trying to train him to roll over“, you can come up with fun situations for players to try out and later to watch in a photo compilation.

Yes, at first it takes time and effort to create games online and run them with an app. But later it pays off in smoother game operation, and, with sparks of creativity, you can almost instantly bring an idea to life for your clients.

Have fun creating games and enjoy the results with happy players!

This article was published originally in Event Industry News on 22.01.2015
http://www.eventindustrynews.co.uk/event-technology-news/5-game-apps-for-2015-to-engage-your-attendees-gamification-made-easy/