Battlesquare: A Risk-style game for the real world
Classic board games continue to serve as inspiration for Foursquare-based games. A few months ago we saw a rash of Monopoly-inspired games. Now the latest, Battlesquare, is modelled on the Risk franchise — but instead of taking over the world, your aim is to take over your city by checking in on Foursquare.
Battlesquare divides each city into territories, just like the classic Risk board. Each time you check in to a venue on Foursquare using the app, you’ll have a chance to roll the dice and play to win it. When you roll a higher number than the current owner, you’ll defeat one of their troops that’s defending the venue. Winning a venue entitles you to station new troops there, helping to secure your territory. Once you’ve secured all the territories in a city, you’ve conquered the entire city.
Like Foursquare, the game comes with its own set of missions that award badges when they’re completed. First Blood, for instance, honors your first win at a venue, while Snake Eyes is awarded if you roll ones on all three dice.
Since each city’s regions must be defined manually, Battlesquare is launching today in a select group of cities (New York, San Francisco, Washington, Chicago, Boston, Los Angeles, Denver, San Jose, Philadelphia, Madrid, Toronto, Paris, Berlin, London, Amsterdam, Cairo). More are already on the way in the next version (including Cincinnati, which is how I was able to test it). If you’re in an area that’s not supported, you can still play the game, but there won’t be any territories for you to conquer, only individual venues.
Battlesquare is launching on the iPhone. It’s on sale in the iTunes app store for 99 cents; tomorrow it goes up to its regular price of $1.99.
If you enjoy Risk and Foursquare, it stands to reason you’ll enjoy Battlesquare. Creator Raul Riera has clearly put a lot of time into creating fun gameplay in an app that looks very well-designed.
Give Battlesquare a try and let us know what you think in the comments.
