1143: Location

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Location

Title text: Ingress: Foursquare With Space Noises.

Explanation

Ingress is an augmented reality location-based service game in which players have to visit certain real-world places marked by the game as containing in-game objectives, called portals. The friend in the comic owns a home surrounded by an abundance of portals, which makes it an attractive destination for Cueball and co.

Foursquare is another service that lets users check into places they visit for discounts in a similar way to how Ingress players visit portals for points.

Transcript

[A group of people around a computer. Cueball is typing.]

Cueball: Hey, party tonight?

Cueball: We'd all like to come see your new place!

Friend (through monitor): Wait, what?

[Cut to friend sitting at a laptop.]

Cueball: We want to hang out!

Friend: We're not like, good friends.

Cueball: I know, but we were thinking about it and we really like you!

[Cut back to Cueball and friends.]

Cueball: You should have us over tonight!

Cueball: For, like, an hour.

Cueball: It'll be fun!

Friend: Well, uh, sure.

[Cut to colour-inverted image of friend's house. Ingress energy wells are surrounding the house.]

Cueball: YESSSS!

Friend: I still don't get why you're suddenly so excited to hang out.

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Discussion

I thought the words "like" and "hang out" were references to facebook's "like" and google's "hang out". What do the native speakers think? -- 213.252.171.254 (talk) 07:56, 5 December 2012 (UTC) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

Not in this case- here they're just being used as the everyday terms that facebook and google co-opted. -- 140.247.0.10 (talk) 08:12, 5 December 2012 (UTC) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

I agree. -- 122.60.40.91 (talk) 09:28, 5 December 2012 (UTC) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

Native speaker here: there doesn't seem to be anything distinctive about the use of 'like' and 'hang out' in this comic to indicate they might be references. -- 170.194.32.42 (talk) 10:33, 5 December 2012 (UTC) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

The words aren't out of place otherwise, so it just might be a (big) coincidence. I still find it likely to be true. 207.237.164.241 11:18, 5 December 2012 (UTC)

It's really not a "big" coincidence at all. 'Like' and 'hang out' are the most obvious word choices in their context in the comic. The same words are used in social network apps because they are common social phrases. It doesn't even warrant the word "coincidence", let alone a "big" coincidence. 46.65.14.73 22:55, 16 December 2012 (UTC)

Another native speaker here. You typically would not "hang out" – in real life – with people you don't "like" – as in you like your friends. There's nothing in the comic to make me think there's any connection with Facebook or Google+. 24.41.5.167 11:44, 5 December 2012 (UTC)

This native speaker agrees. The dialog is ordinary informal American English. That's why facebook and Google hijacked the words. Facebook and Google want to be seen as informal and idiomatic institutions. -- 174.125.142.147 (talk) 15:25, 5 December 2012 (UTC) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

They'll be very disappointed when they discover that he just decorated the bushes around his house with green LED lights for Christmas. --Geoff 128.156.10.80 19:22, 5 December 2012 (UTC)

No explanation for the space noises? Max Nanasy (talk) 21:28, 5 December 2012 (UTC)

The game literally makes space noises. Like... whooosshhshhhssshhoooooshhh. Things like that. 138.110.225.187 22:30, 5 December 2012 (UTC)

Thank you for that. I had no idea what was being referenced, serves me right for not reading the title text. (This is not sarcasm, it sounded like it was when I read it to myself, so I'm adding this disclaimer) lcarsos_a (talk) 22:33, 5 December 2012 (UTC)

But "space noises" is an oxymoron. In space, you can't hear noise. (Oh... you mean bad-sci-fi-movie noises...) 207.225.239.130 19:16, 6 December 2012 (UTC)

Another Google closed beta – you get to play by invite only. Meh 24.41.5.167 23:53, 5 December 2012 (UTC)

I'm trying to find a game that I played on the computer about 2 years ago. I remember that you could see the entire play area the entire time. It was timed. The object was to get to a hole (maybe blue in color) to end the level. There were blocks that often blocked your path, which you needed to push out of your way or more often use them to make bridges to cross water. Some of the levels were very much a timing game where you needed to quickly move a block through a winding path(up, down, left, right only)to avoid being caught by, I believe, moving blocks.The closest screen shot that I've found is Chips Challenge, which is not the game that I played previously. I remember there were many levels, probably between 50 and 100. Ideas?Shine (talk) 15:33, 6 December 2012 (UTC) RESOLVED : game was called SilversphereShine (talk) 21:24, 7 December 2012 (UTC)

RE: Shine. The game was called Rodent's Revenge. Phenomenal Times, Shine, Phenomenal Times. Glad you reminded me about it!

Not the game I was thinking of, but fun game too. No animals of any kind in the game that I'm trying to find Shine (talk) 17:13, 7 December 2012 (UTC)

OK got it. It was called Silversphere. Shine (talk) 21:24, 7 December 2012 (UTC)

I was absolutely certain that the bright green "fountains" were supposed to illustrate some radioactive material and them being "excited" was somehow a particle physics joke I couldnt nail down.

My assumption was that his house was just in a good location to watch some space phenomenon. The Aurora, or a meteor shower.141.101.104.156 12:27, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

You should really try Ingress now. It's great. However, I don't understand what he lives beside that's so portal-worthy. --108.162.218.185 00:54, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

By my house, across the Mississippi from St,l there is a Catholic Church with a portal on two idols and a bell tower. Unfortunately it is just out of reach from my bedroom. 173.245.50.61 20:00, 24 December 2015 (UTC)

Please do some research before the next time you associate the Catholic Church with idolatry. If you would like, I may be able to refer you to some sources at some later time.

—CsBlastoise, a Catholic (talk) 15:29, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

It's not nice to assume malice. In this context he's probably using the definition of "idol" that simply means "statue" ("an image or representation of a god used as an object of worship" via Google) 172.68.46.35 22:37, 5 January 2017 (UTC)

Is Ingress still running and available and stuff?(insert name here) (talk) 16:20, 21 June 2019 (UTC)

Yes, they released version 2.0 (called "Ingress Prime") a few month ago. --SlashMe (talk) 14:21, 3 July 2019 (UTC)

The Ingress reference went way over my head. I thought the joke was people wanting to visit the house because it had a sweet wifi spot nearby. 162.158.186.36 03:54, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

College campuses are also pretty good places to play Ingress. Noteworthy that the old app for ingress is hitting EoL in a few days, and Prime that User:SlashMe mentioned is going to be the only way to play. 162.158.62.21 03:48, 20 September 2019 (UTC)