Show HN: Payphone Tag is territory game using Australia's 15,000 payphones

20 points

1/21/1970

2 days ago

by gangerang

Comments

gangerang

Walk to a payphone, call my number, enter your PIN, capture it and score points. Other players can steal it and you lose points. Form triangles to hold territory. No app or no account. Covers the whole of Australia. I built it because a friend told me you could buy phone numbers for $2 and I wanted to put mine to use. I had collected the payphone dataset from a previous project (where you call into the payphone) so this was a good fit. Since covid, it's actually free to call out from payphones, so the game is completely free to play

2 days ago

wan0net

Keen to hear where you bought a number for $2. I'm looking at getting some for Signal bridges for OpenClaw.

2 days ago

gangerang

Check out CrazyTel in Australia. They're landline numbers though, more expensive for 04x mobiles

2 days ago

ktoo_

This is incredible! Now I have something real-ish to do at lunch time. And I get to play spy! Thanks!

a day ago

gangerang

Be careful, it's slightly addictive!

17 hours ago

mememememememo

Cool idea! Get people out and walking! Yeah you can drive but if 2 or more are close walking wins.

2 days ago

gangerang

Yeah, that the plan. I'm just surprised people are out there running around the city at midnight on a Friday dialling into payphones for fun

2 days ago

mememememememo

Oh it isn't just your mates? Is there new people doing it? Cool if so.

2 days ago

gangerang

Yep! Was just mates but now it's spread to be more people I don't know than I do

2 days ago