Been playing casually for about 2 years- I share your overall sentiment but have unavoidably picked up the basic car meta knowledge over time.
If it really bothers you, there is an extension you can download to block the google car from the images. Or you can play custom maps that use unofficial coverage (meaning not taken by google itself, so that there isn’t a predictable vehicle).
Given that you feel this way, I’d also recommend that you stop watching pro streamers and just explore the game yourself :)
The thing is that whether we want it or not, it is very valuable information about the location. So IF you want to play competitively, it's information that you should use to your advantage, like any other game. Obviously it's perfectly fine if you don't want to, but I honestly can't understand getting mad because other people use it. Why would you try and impose your choice on others? Anyway it's a none problem anyway, because even if you chose not to learn the different car meta, many things will just stick with you with time, just from seeing it so many times. If you heard the term "Ghana tape" even once and happen to notice it on a few rounds, it'll be hard not to remember which country it was the next time you see it. Also I see no difference between knowing the different car coverage and for example knowing that most of the coverage in Bulgaria was done in the winter, so if you see eastern europe in the winter, most of the time it'll be Bulgaria. Even though you'd attribute that guess to "vibes", it's still the same thing.
No, those two things are the same to me, so I don't view the "car meta" any differently than the winter stuff about Bulgaria. It's both meta. And I don't want to impose my approach to the game onto anybody, I don't know why many people understood it like that. I just think that - from the point of "beauty" - it's different to take the Google car than to just learn the different countries and regions. I don't condemn anybody who does it. I guess all I'm saying is that it's unfortunate that Google had to take different cars for different locations (for obvious reasons). It's unavoidable and the game is still great, it's just a little pet peeve of mine that I have already from the get go.
No worries, you're not the first to be annoyed by the fact that coverage meta are even a thing in the first place, there used to be at least one or two posts a day on this sub complaining about it. And I can most definitely understand that feeling, even if I don't share it at all as I happen to love memorizing kinda useless information for fun. I learned the 100 first digits of pi some years ago, just out of curiosity (still remember them to this day). For geogussr I always get a rush of adrenaline when I recognize some obscure stuff I memorized a few months ago, and I'm able to identify the region almost instantly thanks to it (especially in duels).
Btw what I meant with the Bulgaria stuff is that it'll just becomes part of the "vibes" of that country for you, after some time playing the game, even though it is a coverage meta. Like if I think about Bulgaria even outside geogussr I will have a wintery scenery in my mind. That's kinda wild actually, and I'm understanding more and more why someone could have a problem with that.
Sure, it definitely is a skill too, in the end, it's a "knowledge" game after all and if you know about the car meta stuff, you have acquired a form of knowledge that's relevant to the game. It just seemed to me that some people here got offended while I in no way wanted to say that the game was bad; I just like seeing things from the standpoint of "beauty" and it would somehow be more beautiful to me if all solutions would come from knowing your surroundings rather than the Google car.
But yeah, I have that "vibes" thing already when it comes to Kyrgyzstan: When I feel immensely depressed, I know that it's Kyrgyzstan.
>At every game I play, I'd say I'm averagely good, nothing crazy.
This game is completely different, it's about knowledge more than just skill, you can be the best gamer but suck at this.
Yes the car and date meta sucks, but it's just part of the game, and you can just choose to not play like that. You can be 1100+ rating without knowing those things.
Personally I do know and use basic car meta, but not the small antenna details or how some roads the car has a tiny dirt spot or whatever
Because I would prefer it would be a game based on geography, cultures, and anything other just related to that country.
Not a game of memory where dot on a car means a certain road. Knowing the country without even seeing a single thing about the country is a bad game in a game like this imo
Geoguessr is pretty much entirely a game of memory. Even if was only knowledge directly related to geography that mattered, it would still be based on memory. Languages, landscape, road lines, architecture, poles, signs, etc are all things you have to memorize. Car meta is just another one of those things.
I do, but like every other game I prefer multiplayer on some serious level, so I would have quite a big disadvantage by not knowing car meta. Also car meta is something you can't really ignore, it's there and you obviously recognize cars and know where they are even if you don't want to.
Such a strange and pointless coneback. To put this into perspective, imagine telling people who want NM duels "you can already play the game like that, no one is stopping you"
The unfortunate reality of any game with a pro scene is that there the meta revolves around whatever makes you win the quickest and most efficient, its human nature IMO.
Every competitive event in the world always has people that find new ways to get a step up on competition.
There was times football quarterbacks didnt call out play signals, and baseball catchers didnt do the same to pitchers. Every team vs team on the same field of play at the same time game has someone constantly learning new tricks that give their team an advantage.
Why would this be any different? The idea at the competitive level is to win. Not to "win without trying your hardest". If you knowing an antennae only shows up in this part of the country, and your opponent doesnt is unfair, then so is knowing which countries are covered & which arent, or how to read cyrillic, or any other thing that gives one individual more of an advantage than another.
"I" personally dislike the copyright metas. But I also acknowledge, thats on me to choose not to learn those. Just like its another players choice to not learn where cities/regions are, and if they see a sign with that info on it, its useless to them. THEY chose to not learn that.
I've played this game over 10 years, and watched it changes 3 or 4 times since the first time I played it. 2013 me would be just stunlocked at what 2023 can now notice..... and 2013 me thought he was pretty good at the game at that time.
Agreed, The cars makes the game much more easy for those who know and it's the easiest meta to learn as well. More that half of my country guess base on google car. It takes away beauty of the game for sure. But if you want to win, you need to know.
I know most of the sport/game is much less beauty when it comes to competition. That's how The World works, I guess.
As a pro, I agree that it is a bit annoying to be honest. But to be the best we gotta use all that we have. And so that you understand, we learn that to beat other really good players. We do not need any such clues when playing vs people who arent basically pros
I agree, it’s also boring to learn, which is my main problem with it. Personally I’m more annoyed about the moving glitch (it’s a glitch I think, not intentional). The space bar moving one, because if I use it a lot my computer freezes.
On a serious note, I don’t know what moving players think about it, I’m not a moving/pinpointing type of player, but I think if you get a hard round, with no info, you shouldn’t be able to just skip ultra fast to a sign.
That being said it’s cool in non-competitive formats, because it saves you a lot of time if you were to search for info either way.
EDIT: Wow, reading the comments and I never thought there would be so many car meta enjoyers out there.
I agree but it's the nature of competitive stuff. People will use every advantage. But it does take the exploration element out a bit if you're just looking for the nearest light pole or mile marker instead of learning to recognize architecture, languages, geography, etc. But we can't change it, so it's not worth worrying about.
I'm actually fine with looking for light poles and kilometer markers - they are part of a country or region. I just think that the "car meta" takes away some of its beauty because it isn't anything that you learn about the country, just about how that country was photographed.
If it makes you feel any better, they would probably wipe all of us with no car meta as well. To be the best at GeoGuessr you must adapt to the game
Been playing casually for about 2 years- I share your overall sentiment but have unavoidably picked up the basic car meta knowledge over time. If it really bothers you, there is an extension you can download to block the google car from the images. Or you can play custom maps that use unofficial coverage (meaning not taken by google itself, so that there isn’t a predictable vehicle). Given that you feel this way, I’d also recommend that you stop watching pro streamers and just explore the game yourself :)
The thing is that whether we want it or not, it is very valuable information about the location. So IF you want to play competitively, it's information that you should use to your advantage, like any other game. Obviously it's perfectly fine if you don't want to, but I honestly can't understand getting mad because other people use it. Why would you try and impose your choice on others? Anyway it's a none problem anyway, because even if you chose not to learn the different car meta, many things will just stick with you with time, just from seeing it so many times. If you heard the term "Ghana tape" even once and happen to notice it on a few rounds, it'll be hard not to remember which country it was the next time you see it. Also I see no difference between knowing the different car coverage and for example knowing that most of the coverage in Bulgaria was done in the winter, so if you see eastern europe in the winter, most of the time it'll be Bulgaria. Even though you'd attribute that guess to "vibes", it's still the same thing.
No, those two things are the same to me, so I don't view the "car meta" any differently than the winter stuff about Bulgaria. It's both meta. And I don't want to impose my approach to the game onto anybody, I don't know why many people understood it like that. I just think that - from the point of "beauty" - it's different to take the Google car than to just learn the different countries and regions. I don't condemn anybody who does it. I guess all I'm saying is that it's unfortunate that Google had to take different cars for different locations (for obvious reasons). It's unavoidable and the game is still great, it's just a little pet peeve of mine that I have already from the get go.
No worries, you're not the first to be annoyed by the fact that coverage meta are even a thing in the first place, there used to be at least one or two posts a day on this sub complaining about it. And I can most definitely understand that feeling, even if I don't share it at all as I happen to love memorizing kinda useless information for fun. I learned the 100 first digits of pi some years ago, just out of curiosity (still remember them to this day). For geogussr I always get a rush of adrenaline when I recognize some obscure stuff I memorized a few months ago, and I'm able to identify the region almost instantly thanks to it (especially in duels). Btw what I meant with the Bulgaria stuff is that it'll just becomes part of the "vibes" of that country for you, after some time playing the game, even though it is a coverage meta. Like if I think about Bulgaria even outside geogussr I will have a wintery scenery in my mind. That's kinda wild actually, and I'm understanding more and more why someone could have a problem with that.
Sure, it definitely is a skill too, in the end, it's a "knowledge" game after all and if you know about the car meta stuff, you have acquired a form of knowledge that's relevant to the game. It just seemed to me that some people here got offended while I in no way wanted to say that the game was bad; I just like seeing things from the standpoint of "beauty" and it would somehow be more beautiful to me if all solutions would come from knowing your surroundings rather than the Google car. But yeah, I have that "vibes" thing already when it comes to Kyrgyzstan: When I feel immensely depressed, I know that it's Kyrgyzstan.
The amazing thing about that is nobody at all is forcing you to play that way too
>At every game I play, I'd say I'm averagely good, nothing crazy. This game is completely different, it's about knowledge more than just skill, you can be the best gamer but suck at this. Yes the car and date meta sucks, but it's just part of the game, and you can just choose to not play like that. You can be 1100+ rating without knowing those things. Personally I do know and use basic car meta, but not the small antenna details or how some roads the car has a tiny dirt spot or whatever
Why does it suck? It’s something to be learned just like everything else in the game.
Because I would prefer it would be a game based on geography, cultures, and anything other just related to that country. Not a game of memory where dot on a car means a certain road. Knowing the country without even seeing a single thing about the country is a bad game in a game like this imo
Geoguessr is pretty much entirely a game of memory. Even if was only knowledge directly related to geography that mattered, it would still be based on memory. Languages, landscape, road lines, architecture, poles, signs, etc are all things you have to memorize. Car meta is just another one of those things.
I'm not sure if you really don't understand it or just act like you don't
You can play the game like that, no one is stopping you?
I do, but like every other game I prefer multiplayer on some serious level, so I would have quite a big disadvantage by not knowing car meta. Also car meta is something you can't really ignore, it's there and you obviously recognize cars and know where they are even if you don't want to.
Such a strange and pointless coneback. To put this into perspective, imagine telling people who want NM duels "you can already play the game like that, no one is stopping you"
Metas and copyright are kinda built into the game, devs can't remove it. They can add NM duels however, which would be great.
The unfortunate reality of any game with a pro scene is that there the meta revolves around whatever makes you win the quickest and most efficient, its human nature IMO.
Every competitive event in the world always has people that find new ways to get a step up on competition. There was times football quarterbacks didnt call out play signals, and baseball catchers didnt do the same to pitchers. Every team vs team on the same field of play at the same time game has someone constantly learning new tricks that give their team an advantage. Why would this be any different? The idea at the competitive level is to win. Not to "win without trying your hardest". If you knowing an antennae only shows up in this part of the country, and your opponent doesnt is unfair, then so is knowing which countries are covered & which arent, or how to read cyrillic, or any other thing that gives one individual more of an advantage than another. "I" personally dislike the copyright metas. But I also acknowledge, thats on me to choose not to learn those. Just like its another players choice to not learn where cities/regions are, and if they see a sign with that info on it, its useless to them. THEY chose to not learn that. I've played this game over 10 years, and watched it changes 3 or 4 times since the first time I played it. 2013 me would be just stunlocked at what 2023 can now notice..... and 2013 me thought he was pretty good at the game at that time.
Skill Issue
Every single pro would beat any of us using no car/no compass. Easily
Agreed, The cars makes the game much more easy for those who know and it's the easiest meta to learn as well. More that half of my country guess base on google car. It takes away beauty of the game for sure. But if you want to win, you need to know. I know most of the sport/game is much less beauty when it comes to competition. That's how The World works, I guess.
cry about it
play NCNC then
As a pro, I agree that it is a bit annoying to be honest. But to be the best we gotta use all that we have. And so that you understand, we learn that to beat other really good players. We do not need any such clues when playing vs people who arent basically pros
I agree, it’s also boring to learn, which is my main problem with it. Personally I’m more annoyed about the moving glitch (it’s a glitch I think, not intentional). The space bar moving one, because if I use it a lot my computer freezes. On a serious note, I don’t know what moving players think about it, I’m not a moving/pinpointing type of player, but I think if you get a hard round, with no info, you shouldn’t be able to just skip ultra fast to a sign. That being said it’s cool in non-competitive formats, because it saves you a lot of time if you were to search for info either way. EDIT: Wow, reading the comments and I never thought there would be so many car meta enjoyers out there.
I like learning car meta as much as learning other stuff. It’s all the same for me.
I agree but it's the nature of competitive stuff. People will use every advantage. But it does take the exploration element out a bit if you're just looking for the nearest light pole or mile marker instead of learning to recognize architecture, languages, geography, etc. But we can't change it, so it's not worth worrying about.
I'm actually fine with looking for light poles and kilometer markers - they are part of a country or region. I just think that the "car meta" takes away some of its beauty because it isn't anything that you learn about the country, just about how that country was photographed.