October 2025—I stumble across a vintage maps online and got very excited. They’re just so beautifully illustrated, and show how cities evolved soo nicely!
There are niche communities dedicated to sharing old maps, georeferencing them, and expensive collector shops to buy originals. But few people outside of those communities care.
A plan develops: I want to make old maps accessible & fun, in the form of a game.
November 2025—I settle on the following gameplay loop: you get a riddle, and have to find the described location on the map. As a reward you get the history of the place you’ve found.
There are 10 cities to choose from, with 3 maps of different years each.
The place data comes from the Wikipedia scraper I built for Open World, with hand-drawn riddle polygons. The maps are manually georeferenced.
December 2025—The “Earn Real Prizes” in the previous screenshot is maybe a huge distraction, but also just so cool IMO. If you complete a city in the app, you can order a physical version of the map to remember it.
Because of the Sticker Collective, I now have a professional printer at home, so it’s also partly an excuse to try out on-demand commercial printing & shipping.
January 2026—Marketing the app is not hugely successful, but does lead to some installs. As usual - the simplest / most direct content does best.
Feedback from users: it’s frustrating if you cannot find a location on the map. Since the riddles are AI generated based on screenshots, they’re not always the best.
February 2026—Will come back to this project with a fresh approach in a bit.
