Project Landmark

A community-built scavenger hunt in your hometown

Inspiration

We love nature and want others to visit some of the interesting spots we've been at. Even better, we wanted to make it an adventure for them so they can have a unique experience. We all enjoyed playing Pokemon Go, so we wanted to create a similar but parallel experience.

We took inspiration from a quest in Zelda: Breath of the Wild and the hobby geocaching to make a real-world scavenger hunt. We want to instill a sense of exploration and discovery for people in the real world. Our app encourages players to look at the world in a new way, like a natural treasure trove of landscapes and hiding places.

What it does

Our app encourages players to get out there and explore the world we live in. There is a lot of interesting adventures that await, and this app is designed to help "jumpstart" those journeys.

Players are able to place hotspots on the community map or look for current hotspots. These hotspots can be various things, from a nice viewpoint to a secret location. When a user is placing a hotspot, they will need to have a QR code handy, which we provide free of cost. The QR code is hidden or put in plain sight, up to the user. The user then takes a picture of the scene, and this image is uploaded to the firebase.

A player who is looking for hotspots will need to be willing to take the road less traveled. When they are looking for a hotspot, they are only given the general location and a picture. The user's phone will notify if they are nearing the hotspot. Using these tools, a user must try to locate the QR code.

Players of this game can be hiders or seekers. Players can go out in the world and find a nice spot to take a picture of a nice landscape or something else remarkable and recognizable. Then, they take a picture of it with our app, which records that position. Then, they can take a QR code that we generated and put it where they took the picture, challenging other players to find it.

Players can also see pictures that other players took of locations near to them. Once they choose one or more, they try and find where the person who made it was when they took the picture, based on the landmarks they can recognize from it. The app also alerts the player when they are close. Once the player finds the location, they can scan the QR code to confirm that they found it.

How they built it

We used Android Studio to design our app. We used Firebase for our database. We coded in Java and XML. We used our sweat and tears.

Challenges they ran into

A lot of the stuff we did this weekend took a lot of work. This program was very ambitious and we ran into a lot of problems. Some big ones included:

• Implementing Firebase

• Creating a clean UI

• Getting GPS coordinates and using them effectively

• Automating an email system

Accomplishments they are proud of

We were able to create a decent app in a very short amount of time. Our time usage was very efficient, and because of that, we got a lot of work done. Of course, there are still some minor bugs in our product, but they shouldn't be too hard to iron out.

Some notable accomplishments include:

• Effectively dividing the workload amongst teammates,

• Working efficiently on our own tasks, while also helping each other out,

• Combining our individual skill sets to make one group project.

What they learned

We learned that we are able to accomplish a lot if we put our minds together. We knew this would be a challenge, but the outcome was worth it. We learned how to have fun but work efficiently.

Each of us brought our own experiences to the table. Some of us were proficient in Android Studio, while others were skilled using Firebase. We all were exposed to each other's expertise and learned how to integrate our skills together.

What’s next?

There are a lot of features that we haven't been able to implement yet but are hoping to in the next few hours. If all goes well, we should have at least some of these features working by the end of Cruzhacks

A couple of these features: Leaderboard Ability to change the difficulty of landmarks Ability to filter hotspots in terms of difficulty Sharing pictures taken to social media.

Built with:

• Android studio

• Firebase

• Java

• Xml

Try it out:

https://github.com/deancampagnolo/Project-Landmark

Devpost Link:

https://devpost.com/software/project-landmark