Real-world gaming · Social exploration
Turning weekend city exploration into a real-life game.
We spend countless hours exploring virtual worlds and completing quests in video games, but our actual physical neighborhoods often go unexplored. I built CitiQuest as an experiment in bringing that sense of curiosity into everyday life: giving people fun, low-stakes reasons to step outside, discover new spots, and document their adventures.
Live product
Current product screens from citiquest.app
The hardest part of getting people to do something in the physical world is decision fatigue. If you present someone with a massive bucket list, they get overwhelmed and stay home. The app had to make picking an activity feel effortless, verify completion without feeling invasive, and offer just enough reward loop to build a habit of curious exploration.
Instead of asking users to plan an entire weekend day, the catalog prompts them to pick just one or two quick sidequests—like trying a new tea spot or snapping a photo of local architecture. Keeping the barrier low gets people moving.
I built a lightweight submission flow where players upload a photo to verify their quest. This doubles as a personal adventure log they can look back on, showing all the unique places they visited.
Built XP rewards, streak mechanics, and neighborhood rankings so exploring your immediate surroundings feels like contributing to your community standing.
CitiQuest is live and being played. It is an ongoing project where I test how game design principles can be used ethically to encourage healthier, more active, and more social real-world behavior.