[HN Gopher] TimeGuessr
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TimeGuessr
Author : stefanpie
Score : 241 points
Date : 2025-06-10 05:56 UTC (4 days ago)
(HTM) web link (timeguessr.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (timeguessr.com)
| mmahemoff wrote:
| This is fun! I didn't immediately notice the time slider and
| thought it was just GeoGuessr with historical pictures, but the
| time element adds a whole new dimension.
| xeonmc wrote:
| Should probably be renamed to "Spacetime Guesser"
| fcatalan wrote:
| I do the timeguessr daily every day almost as a ritual, it's fun,
| satisfying and educative.
|
| It's also very interesting to watch people try after you've done
| it: how they catch on stuff you missed, their strategies to find
| and date things, or how they infuriatingly ignore whatever was
| the giveaway to you.
| justbeingbored wrote:
| Just played 5 rounds. I wanted to see my score as ranked against
| others, but u didn't do that. That's like me saying here is 800
| points for your post. There is no context for the score.
| gblargg wrote:
| Does it at least tell you how close you were for each one?
| (feedback so you can improve)
| fcatalan wrote:
| Yes there's a feedback page for each round explaining the pic
| and showing the location, also a breakdown page after every 5
| round match.
| fcatalan wrote:
| Yes, score rankings are missing. There's a leaderboard for the
| daily, but only shows accounts you have friended.
|
| For reference, I tend to hover around 44k for the daily. 48k is
| a lucky/easy day, 40k some disaster happened. Under 40 is very
| rare. I like to think that would be above average, but without
| rankings I don't know :)
| xboxnolifes wrote:
| The context is how close you were to the correct answer, not to
| your peers.
| jen729w wrote:
| I got ~28,000.
| cellis wrote:
| indeed, this is screaming for a leaderboard and eventual
| Geoguesser. Sadly I do believe the reasoning models can one
| shot this? Maybe would take away all the fun
| me_bx wrote:
| The game 'Whentaken' [1] follows the exact same concept.
|
| Just mentioning in case people are interested in alternatives /
| slightly different UX.
|
| [1]: https://whentaken.com/
| JimDabell wrote:
| Also whichyr: https://whichyr.com
|
| Discussed here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43715024
| motoxpro wrote:
| whichyr is awesome. I feel terrible about myself that I am
| systematically below average.
| eastbound wrote:
| I find the UX of Whichyr much better, but it doesn't have the
| geographical component. But you see your final ranking on a
| gaussian curve and it's fun!
|
| https://whichyr.com/
|
| And here are other games in that style of 5-minutes cultural
| guesses:
|
| https://framed.wtf/
|
| https://gaps.wtf/
|
| https://sutom.nocle.fr/
|
| https://globle.org/?
|
| https://worldlegame.io/?
|
| https://flagle.gg/
|
| https://phrazle.gg/
|
| https://numberle.org/
|
| Not working currently but guess a historical moment:
| https://www.historle.com/?#
|
| Guess a wikipedia page: https://pedantle.certitudes.org
| tasuki wrote:
| I'm at 200 tries for the "Guess a wikipedia page" thing,
| completely exhausted, and not getting anywhere. Very
| frustrating, yet I can't bring myself to abandon it...
| tesuto wrote:
| Out of curiosity, I wonder why the game chose Apple Maps. I would
| have expected OpenStreetMap. Interesting choice.
| mocmoc wrote:
| love it
| stephenhandley wrote:
| Super fun! Would be cool to be able to challenge someone after
| going through a round. Also maybe clear CTA after round on way to
| sign up to save your score.
| ukprogrammer wrote:
| Great idea! What's the tech stack?
| alexkearns wrote:
| Not quite the same but we created a timeline ordering game for US
| presidents: https://www.tiki-toki.com/timeline/entry/1842261/US-
| Presiden...
|
| You can also use our app to create timeline ordering games on
| subjects of your own choosing.
| nokita wrote:
| Irretrievably hung my phone requiring a hard reset.
|
| Using Chrome on vanilla Android on Samsung.
| mh- wrote:
| Seems like an issue with the OS? Surely a web page in a
| userland app like Chrome shouldn't be able to do that..
| brahma-dev wrote:
| This is how it renders for me. https://imgur.com/a/kJmNMUR
| pastage wrote:
| Some photos are off by at least 100 meters and it is surprising
| how easy a photo can be off a year so easily. I believe it
| happens because the easy timestamp is at the time of development,
| means you can easily be two years off. Also surprising how easy
| it is to get exact date and time of day on some of the photos.
| phgn wrote:
| Why do I have to pick both a location AND year? Why not focus
| this game on the year only?
| cheschire wrote:
| You'll probably enjoy this game then
|
| https://whichyr.com/
| tasuki wrote:
| All the pictures I got were from the US. That makes me happy
| with my 3955 (Top 31%) score, though I'd have appreciated
| more geographical variety.
| kaishiro wrote:
| That's like asking why a weather app needs both a date and city
| - the temperature on July 4th matters, but it's completely
| different in New York vs. Cairo. Same with this - the year sets
| the global context, but the location defines the local
| experience.
| cosmodev wrote:
| I just clicked to take a quick look, and suddenly found myself
| playing it's a simple but surprisingly enjoyable game
| rossant wrote:
| Nice. Got 30,527.
| junon wrote:
| 30,592/50,000 is higher than I thought I'd get. This is fun!
|
| One of the photos was someone holding a phone with Timeguessr on
| it. Still managed to get the date wrong - it was taken in 2024.
| eej71 wrote:
| I got lucky - I got the Hagia Sophia twice.
| captn3m0 wrote:
| I couldn't figure out how the time picker worked (and that there
| was a time picker) till the third round when I realised I was
| being penalized. Got 34k still.
| trebligdivad wrote:
| I'm glad you figured it out...I don't see a map to put a pin
| into.
| Humphrey wrote:
| This is fun! While some are obvious, and some you need to "cheat"
| by Googling - it's really fun looking at a part of the world you
| wouldn't normally browse a map of.
| whamlastxmas wrote:
| Very fun!
| golfer wrote:
| Cute game! Needs an easy way to maximize the picture so you can
| see it full screen (on laptop).
| Jordan-117 wrote:
| Love their selection of photos more than the competition -- more
| likely to contain giveaways like a famous location from an
| unusual angle or a subtle date, so it feels more like detective
| work than guesswork. Just wish it reset at midnight local.
| king_phil wrote:
| Did not work too well for me on mobile. One time it did not
| scroll but went back, one time controls were missing
| mh- wrote:
| I didn't try the web based one, but the mobile app works great.
| sundarurfriend wrote:
| Scrolling with the mouse on the image (no Ctrl or anything, just
| scroll) zooms into the section of the image you're on, for anyone
| else trying "Open image in new tab" or other ways to zoom in.
|
| I'm a big GeoGuessr fan, and had heard of TimeGuessr occasionally
| in those circles. I'd assumed it would be mostly pictures from
| the USA and so wasn't massively interested, and from trying it
| out now, I wasn't too far off: most of the images were from the
| US and Western Europe, and every single picture so far has been
| from a rich country. There are obvious reasons for that, and it's
| not a bad thing in some absolute terms, but it makes it kinda
| boring for me - the big appeal of GeoGuessr for me is that you
| routinely get dropped off in a country that you don't often think
| of, and momentarily get to see and imagine life through their
| eyes.
|
| Maybe over time, TimeGuessr will also accumulate images from more
| varied places - or maybe one of the alternatives mentioned in
| this thread (whentaken and whichyr) already do better in that
| regard?
| InitialLastName wrote:
| I don't know, my pictures definitely biased towards "cameras
| are accessible in these places" but I had modern Nepal and
| Bangladesh, as well as 1930's Finland.
| NooneAtAll3 wrote:
| > Scrolling with the mouse
|
| once again nobody cares about laptop users :/
| pmxi wrote:
| This is really cool.
|
| However, my first photo said "Times Square, NY" in the corner,
| with a copyright for 1908 which gave it all away.
| SamBam wrote:
| Fun! I was surprised how often I was 1 year off and in the right
| city for things that I was just guessing about.
|
| On small error I found: there's a photo that's outside Piazza
| Navona in Rome in the 30s, which it lists as being 700 meters
| away at Piazza Venezia. I know I'm correct -- I lived a street
| away from there.
| hdjrudni wrote:
| Maybe it moved 700m since the 30s? =)
| Arech wrote:
| I absolutely love 3 dimensional nature of the game and how
| carefully many images are chosen to allow for a precise spacetime
| localization with a bit of a research. Super enjoyable experience
| in startling contrast with geogessr, which I don't even want to
| open. Thanks a ton!
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(page generated 2025-06-14 23:00 UTC)