Understanding the Dynamics of Trust in Location-Based Games as Hybrid Spaces: The Players' Perspective

Location-based games (LBGs) merge digital play with physical environments, creating hybrid spaces that require players to navigate complex trust dynamics. Despite their global popularity, LBGs introduce unique challenges around fairness, safety, and privacy, spanning interactions among players, game systems, local communities, and non-players in shared public spaces. To examine how trust is perceived, built, and sustained in these environments, we conducted in-depth interviews with 26 players of four major LBGs: Pokémon GO, Monster Hunter Now, Ingress, and Pikmin Bloom. Using reflexive thematic analysis, we identified dynamics of trust across four trustor–trustee relationships: player–system, player–player, player–community, and player–non-player in five key aspects: fair play, location privacy, online vetting, hybrid interaction, and public play. Drawing on our findings, we propose a trust model for analyzing and designing trust in LBGs as hybrid spaces, and we outline design implications aimed at strengthening trust building and sustaining trustworthy interactions across the LBG ecology.