“I have always found entrepreneurship rather unsympathetic,” says Jonas Schmidt. He is more of the creative type, and has never dreamed of his own start-up like so many others. Now he’s a founder, doing things like attractive marketing and website optimization – and sounds quite enthusiastic when he talks about it. He and Adrian Traganis, Schmidt’s business partner and former school colleague, offer virtual scavenger hunts through Munich. Whoever takes part is out and about, he or she solves the puzzles on the mobile phone.
The two want to combine two things with “Unboxed Tactics”. Gamers should learn something about the place where they are traveling – and they should solve a criminal case. Logic is important here, says Schmidt: “We don’t just want to string together senseless puzzles.” The two of them address very different people with their idea. This year there were many larger groups, says Schmidt, school classes, for example, or companies. “Some want to use it to upgrade their Sunday stroll.” Sometimes people want to replace the classic city tour with the tours, but the basic tendency was shown by a survey by the two of them: People come mainly because of the puzzles.
The most popular tour of the two leads through the Munich Olympic Park.
(Photo: Alessandra Schellnegger)
How they look is very different. Anyone who tries the “Tatort Olympiapark” tour, the most popular tour of the two, has to look for a number on a surveillance camera at the subway station, another time examine a criminal’s letter displayed on the cell phone and find a logic to uncover the information hidden in it recognize. The players enter the answers into their mobile phones, and those who can’t figure it out can get tips. If a puzzle is solved, information is displayed: Sometimes only the fact that the current location is a good place for a photo, but sometimes also the information that is certain to be new for one Munich resident that the Oberwiesenfeld site was the predecessor of the airport Riem was the city’s main airport.
Without the lockdown, the project would probably never have come about
Schmidt and Traganis started the tours during the first Corona lockdown in March 2020. Both were 17 at the time and were in eleventh grade. Homeschooling was the name of the game, “otherwise you couldn’t do anything anyway,” says Schmidt. So there was time to gradually build up the project. The technology and the basic idea did not come from the two of them themselves. The team from “City Quest”, which comes from the escape room industry, asked them whether they, as two of several creators, would not even try such tours want. They later built the website, and they all thought of the tours themselves. Today, “City Quest” is said to be “really proud” of both of them.
Schmidt is now studying philosophy, and Traganis will soon be starting dual business studies. They are developing the tours on the side, there are four in total for Munich. When taking a new tour, you always ask yourself what the place has to offer: How can you get in touch with the “real world”? Then they write texts, create cards. In the existing scavenger hunts, they analyze data: How long do people need, at what point do they get stuck? They now also offer gift boxes. How to build a website, where to best place which information, how to find it more easily on Google: You have acquired the knowledge yourself, through YouTube videos and blog articles. In monetary terms, they both come to a few hundred euros a month after deducting the expenses, says Schmidt: “The idea wasn’t how to earn as much money as possible, but when the first 50 euros came in, it was cool.”
A lot is done on the mobile phone during the scavenger hunts. However, it is important for both of them to include the environment – there is one question that players can solve with the help of these prints on Lake Olympia.
(Photo: Alessandra Schellnegger)
“How many small mini internships in different areas”
Today Schmidt has even made friends with the start-up mentality. “It’s like a lot of small mini-internships in different areas”, that’s how he sees it. Above all, it is fun to think about the tours, to research in the different places. In the summer of 2021, graduating from high school, the two were on the road for a few weeks and drove to other cities. Because: They are now also offering tours there. In Vienna, for example, in Hamburg and Bremen. Friends and acquaintances are then asked which locations would be suitable, and they also take on the test games.
Did you ever have doubts about the project, or did the whole thing become too much for you? There was no financial pressure, says Schmidt, and above all time and ideas were invested – and you had enough of those in the lockdown anyway. “In principle, we had nothing to lose.”
Those interested can find the tours at www.unboxedtactics.de. For those who play games, the information that you sometimes have to make do with a mobile phone flashlight in the dark – and ski gloves are certainly not out of place on the two-hour tours, should be relevant.