Smarty Pins
- Brand
- Year
- 2014
- Objective
- Engagement
- Industry
- Tech & Telecom
- Mechanic
- Quiz & Trivia
- Platform
- Web
- Agency
- Hook
Objective
Google Maps wanted to drive engagement with its mapping product by letting people play with the Maps API and its design language right in the browser, with no app to install — and to surface features existing users hadn't discovered yet. The game was built knowing no paid media would drive traffic to it, so it had to spread on its own through sharing and press, and its July 2014 launch was timed to ride that summer's World Cup with a football-themed round of questions.
Solution
Smarty Pins turns the Google Maps interface itself into the game. A trivia question appears — about culture, sports, history or science — and instead of typing an answer, the player grabs the familiar red Maps pin and drags it to wherever on the map they think the answer is. The score is a bank of miles: the closer the pin lands to the correct spot, the fewer miles burn off, while a wildly wrong guess costs heavily. Each drop reveals the correct location against the player's guess and rolls straight into the next question, and the round continues until the mile balance runs out.
Results
Over its run, Smarty Pins was played by nearly four million people who answered more than thirteen million questions, averaging over five minutes per session. It launched fast, drawing 3.2 million plays in its first few weeks, and with only minimal banner support and no paid media behind it, the game relied on press pickup to reach players — earning 416 articles, including coverage from Polygon, The Verge, TechCrunch and The Huffington Post.
- 1
The player opens Smarty Pins in a browser on phone, tablet, or desktop, with no download required. Before the first question, the player either starts with random questions or picks one of six categories, including Arts & Culture, Science & Geography, Sports & Games, Entertainment, History & Current Events, and a rotating featured category.
- 2
The player starts each session with a bank of 1,000 miles that functions as both score and lives; the game continues only as long as miles remain.
- 3
For each question, the map camera moves to a region near the correct answer rather than a random location, giving the player a geographic hint before the question is even read.
- 4
A card appears over the map posing a trivia question from culture, sports, history, or science whose answer is a place, such as a city, country, or landmark.
- 5
A 15-second timer runs alongside the question, burning one bonus mile per second; the player can request a hint early and forfeit the remaining bonus miles, or let the timer run out to reveal the hint automatically.
- 6
The player answers by dragging a red Google Maps pin to the spot on the map they believe is correct, then confirms with a Submit Answer button; there is no text input.
- 7
The game reveals the correct location and measures the real-world distance between it and the player's pin, deducting that many miles from the bank for a wrong guess or preserving the bank for an exact hit, paired with a flavor-text response praising or ribbing the result.
- 8
Any unused bonus miles from the timer are added back to the bank, and the next question begins immediately, repeating the question-timer-pin-result cycle without menus or pauses.
- 9
The session ends once the mile bank is depleted, with the player's performance measured by how many questions they answered before running out.
- 10
After the game ends, the player can share their result via Google+, Facebook, or Twitter.
