GameSpot - Non Traditional RPG - Ambient Quest

GameSpot has news of what seems a patently silly idea to me called Ambient Quest, an experimental game in development by an academic from Wales. I'll let this paragraph speak for itself:

In Ambient Quest, players wear a pedometer attached to their belt or pocket, which counts the number of steps that they take. For every 300 steps, players get one move in the PC role-playing game. Each move opens up more squares on the map, and opportunities to find food, treasure, or fight monsters to gain experience. Eyles commented, "Players' real actions in the real world effect an avatar in a virtual world. You can either change your actions in the real world to help your avatar. Or not."

More information.

*If* anyone buys this, all they are going to do is figure out a way to trick the pedometer and just rack up a bunch of "steps" without even moving.

silly? I would use something more along the lines of retarded!

I think that the whole idea of real-world integration is interesting, as it is also used in many other games:
- Animal Crossing has a real-world time cycles that synchronize with your DS (or Cube) clock.
- The new Pokemon DS games have certain Pokemon that can only be evolved during certain hours (and since some are from 8pm to 4am, my kids won't see *them* any time soon!)

But integration like this game is trying is going to be difficult - but at least it is asking the question and pushing the envelope.

Pedometer + Paint Mixer + eBay + ??? = Profits

Perhaps it's use is to motivate you to exercise? It certainly would demotivate me to play the game.

I'd like to see this as an offline thing.

Could be healthy : It makes more people go jogging.