BotFighters:

October 19, 2001 12:54 AM

BotFighters: BotFighters is a brand new type of action game. The mission of the game is to track down and battle with other players, but in BotFighters, the real world is the game arena. You have to move yourself physically close enough to be able to hit. The game concept is similar to "Gotcha!", or virtual paintball. Your mobile phone is used as a weapon and a radar device to track down opponents. When playing, you can at all times be attacked by other players, so be careful! You play with your mobile phone by sending SMS commands to number 6688. (from play)
posted by andrew cooke (8 comments total)

excellent. i'd known mobile phone games to be played outside of the States, and this is damn cool. I'd kinda forgotten about it, as I don't have my own phone yet, and saturation has not been reached yet.

The Great Unwired must be enlightened!
posted by firestorm at 1:02 AM on October 19, 2001

Only in Sweden, currently. At least that's what the FAQ says. *sigh*

It uses the GSM infrastructure to locate you, apparently. This is an interesting application of the location-senstive services possible when you can be positioned within a small cell.
posted by djfiander at 4:12 AM on October 19, 2001

How long before there's a service to tell you when you're near someone who's "sexually compatible"? You'd fill in a form like a dating agency, but more explicit... (at least, I'm assuming dating agency forms are along the lines of "do you like reading books?", but I guess I may just be old fashioned).
posted by andrew cooke at 4:40 AM on October 19, 2001

Not long. I've been seeing stuff like that at trade shows for several years now. They're generally custom devices at this point, but there's no reason why they couldn't just put the functionality into a cell phone.
posted by gd779 at 4:47 AM on October 19, 2001

andrew cooke:
there is, kinda...

and of course, gaydar!
posted by sawks at 4:52 AM on October 19, 2001

BT in the UK currently supply a GSM 'FindMe' service that tells you where the nearest Bar, Takeout etc is .... can't say I've used it yet tho...
posted by MintSauce at 6:33 AM on October 19, 2001

Gaydar. Yikes. Now next time I have my Saturday coffee in Bossa "they" are going to work out my guilty secret...
posted by andrew cooke at 7:00 AM on October 19, 2001

Vodafone's Vizzavi service does this via WAP for all sorts of things like that. It is fun. But not a game, more's the pity.
posted by nedrichards at 5:12 PM on October 19, 2001