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[Starflier]

I've been thinking about the iPhone, and how it is probably the first gaming platform with both a gps and an orientation sensor, and thinking about how those could be used together for game control schemes never before possible.
My first reaction is something like a cross between geocaching and tag where you hunt down other players using the iPhone as a radar. (ooh, it has a camera too, doesn't it? Possibilities...)
Then I was thinking of a game where you fight creatures in a spiritual "subworld". You use the iphone to be able to see them...

[___]

There's a nifty DS title that takes advantage of wifi signals and turns them into treasure: http://www.clubtreasureworld.com/about

I'm not sure if something like this exists on the iphone though!  Could be expanded quite a bit with all the iphone gizmos.

[mewse]

There's a nifty DS title that takes advantage of wifi signals and turns them into treasure: http://www.clubtreasureworld.com/about

I love the idea of grabbing real world data and using it somehow within a game world.  It's like the "Barcode Battlers" thing which happened just a wee bit too late for me to be the right age to take part in it, where you scanned barcodes on everyday products to generate arena fighters.

The DS game is really built around the "collect WiFi signals to get treasure" approach, and requires lots of different treasure art assets in order to keep players playing (they say that it has 2500 different treasures in the game), so it's not really a design that's indie-budget-friendly.  But something more like the "Barcode Battlers" approach where you're driving statistics off of some real world data, and then using those statistics in your game;  that's more likely to be directly applicable.

[bateleur]

Scope clearly exists to do something like PacManhattan, but fully automated. Also, augmented reality is a good area to explore if the camera APIs are good enough.

[Starflier]

Scope clearly exists to do something like PacManhattan, but fully automated.

Totally, that would be awesome. To me the coolest thing would be using your movement in the real world to control your character in a virtual world...
That could be the ultimate "off the couch" game. Eat your heart out WiiFit...
Also, the AV thing would be cool too. I don't think the accelometer or the camera are good enough yet, but imagine looking through your iPod at the scene in front of you, except there's a dragon/alien starship/giant inflatable cat floating over the trees... Dudes, we have almost arived.

Now if only Apple weren't so persnikkety about who gets sdks and what apps can be on iTunes...

[moi]

real life where in the world is carmen sandiego, with escort girls as the reward.

[Powergloved Andy]

There is actually a GPS "Mario" app on iPhone where you enter your information and then it generates locations in your general area. You have to travel around town to collect coins and mushrooms. It's odd, and I have not downloaded it. 

[Bree]

There was a cell phone game a while back, made by some college students for their media class- some college out in California, I think. But the game had the player literally running away from a increasing zombie horde. The player used their phone's GPS to determine their location and to spawn zombies that appear on the phone screen.

[JamesPopStar]

There is actually a GPS "Mario" app on iPhone where you enter your information and then it generates locations in your general area. You have to travel around town to collect coins and mushrooms. It's odd, and I have not downloaded it. 

I saw this, and was surprised Nintendo didn't jump on that with the legal hammer.

At first glance, it seems there is a lot of possibility for games that use the GPS, but I just haven't seen any that do it "right". That is, in such a way that it really catches on and gets many people playing. Games that use a GPS seem well suited for a situation where many people are joining in playing, and that can be a difficult ramp up to get people started on.

[Strom]

How about a game like scorched earth except the Entire EARTH

Graphics would be wireframe on a 3d globe
At home you would start the app and that would register on a central server as your "Base" . While you are not at home you could launch missles around the globe [Think DEFCON execpt 3D] , each time you would launch a missle the position would be logged with the central server that would be viewable to anyone who is playing the game.From the locations that the missles are launched you could find the location of the players base
and launch a missle at the base and destroy it.

[Starflier]

real life where in the world is carmen sandiego, with escort girls as the reward.

Take out the escort girls and you might have something.
Might be hard to convince people to go through all that time and expense.
It would be cool as a google earth plug in though

[Starflier]

Checkit out: http://www.terrapainter.com/
Not exactly a game per-se but coolness