Swarm just got a little more like the old Foursquare.The local search and discovery service just introduced two new competitive features to Swarm: themed leaderboards and golden stickers.
These are essentially revamped versions of features from the original Foursquare app.
In the original Foursquare, each check-in was assigned a point value.
Weekly totals were tallied up on the app's leaderboard, which displayed the weekly scores of you and your friends. Swarm initially launched without the feature, but Foursquare added a new kind of leaderboard in its latest update.
Foursquare Reintroduces Leaderboards in Swarm Update:
"Not everyone has friends who go to the same places as them, so we created a new way for you to compete against your friends, no matter where they are in the world," the company wrote Monday in a blog post.
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Much like the app's "reimagined" mayorships, which now pits users against their circle of friends for the title (previously, venues could only have one mayor) points are now assigned based on categories with separate leaderboards for different types of places, such as bars and movie theaters.
And while badges are still nowhere to be found in Swarm, the new leaderboard also comes with a reward system: golden stickers. Any time a user gets to the top of a leaderboard for any type of venue, they earn a golden sticker, which gets added to their check-in.
The update is another sign that Foursquare is backtracking on some of the more unpopular changes it's made. Many longtime users were unhappy when the company split its app in two; among their chief complaints: the loss of Foursquare's game mechanics.
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While it has defended the move, previously saying the "game" aspect was unintentional and features like points "became arbitrary," the company seems to be trying to appease users who miss these features. (Swarm's iOS and Android apps both continue to have low ratings in their respective app stores.)
APPS-AND-SOFTWARE, APPS AND SOFTWARE, FOURSQUARE, SWARM, TECH, FOURSQUARE, LEADERBOARDS BY FOURSQUARE.
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