This article was taken from the October 2012 issue of Wired magazine. Be the first to read Wired's articles in print before they're posted online, and get your hands on loads of additional content by <span class="s1">subscribing online.
Recce is London's most intricately detailed 3D map. Although designed to look like a video-game-style city, the app offers a hyper-accurate view of London from above. "Every man-made structure in London can be seen, from the Shard to someone's garden shed," says Ian Hetherington, CEO of parent company eeGeo.
The London-based startup draws on 12 data sources, including TomTom maps, Ordnance Survey data and travel information, to provide transport-route recommendations.
Released in July, the free iOS app includes animations of moving trains, boats bobbing on the Thames and even traffic jams.
The original idea was to create a location-based game, says Hetherington, who as managing director of Sony Computer Entertainment helped design the first PlayStation console. When he started writing Recce's software with ex-Google engineer Rian Liebenberg, they realised it could be a 3D browser with apps built into it.
Below the 3D map layer, they built a local discovery engine. Clicking "Around Me Now" brings up cafés and shops in your vicinity. Recce ranks the spots according to social buzz on platforms such as Facebook and Foursquare, or reviews in the Guardian or Time Out.
In late September, Recce will launch Go Deliver, a real-time social game. Users deliver virtual parcels as they move around the city, play with others by forming delivery chains and get discounts by bringing virtual parcels to businesses.
Recce maps for other UK cities, San Francisco and New York are in progress. The two cofounders also want to integrate independent
services such as taxi bookings and restaurant reservations into the app. "Ultimately," says Liebenberg, "we want Recce to be a self-contained, hyperlocal world."
recce.at
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
