PlayStation Vita now has an AR experience called “Open Me!”

PlaysStation Vita has now joined the consoles that are offering augmented reality games to their players, allowing the device camera to make it appear as though virtual elements are functioning within the real world.

This use of AR technology has already proven to be successful in the launch of the Nintendo 3DS.

Now, Open Me! is an augmented reality game that is available on PlayStation Vita and is being seen as one of the best attempts to show that using AR tech can give consumers and gamers a “good time.” This experience involves a number of different locked box puzzles, each of which has been rendered in 3D.

This augmented reality game uses an AR marker card to establish the position of the box in front of the player.

Using the marker card lets the player use the Vita mobile device to be able to examine the puzzle box from any angle he or she would like. The purpose is to be able to identify the switch, button, or combination of those two things, which will allow the box to open. The earliest puzzles are the simplest, to allow the user to become used to the concept.

Once the basics have been learned, the designs of the puzzle boxes become increasingly complex. Among the options are certain examples that force the player to “think outside the box”, such as a cuckoo clock that requires the user to catch onto the fact that he or she must set the time on the clock to match that in the real world in order to open it correctly.

That said, there are also some puzzles that aren’t quite taking full advantage of what an augmented reality game has to offer, in that the controls of the game are not quite up to the precision level that is required in order to be able to complete the puzzle. Beyond that, there are certain boxes that need two Vita players to work together on a shared puzzle to be able to open them up – which is great as long as the user knows someone else with the same device and skill level.

Mobile spending grows, but retailers miss out on a significant opportunity

The 2013 holiday shopping season has proven to be quite successful for most retailers and brands. A recent report from comScore show that online spending passed $46 billion during the holiday season while another report from the National Retail Federation notes that overall spending reached $601 billion. Mobile spending has grown significantly in 2013, but Jumio, a market research firm, has released a new report that suggests that mobile commerce has missed a major opportunity.

Mobile commerce misses out on $16 billion

According to the report from Jumio, mobile commerce missed out on $16 billion over the 2013 holiday season. Overall, the report shows that mobile spending has grown, but many consumers have reported a lackluster experience with their shopping experience. Mobile shopping platforms from retailers were launched late last year in order to attract the mobile audience, but these platforms were hastily developed and some were crippled by glitches that prevented people from purchasing products.

Abandoned carts may be the culprit behind the loss of revenue

The problem may lie with abandoned shopping carts. Carts are quite common in e-commerce and they serve as a place where products are stored before the checkout process has been finalized. Jumio suggests that consumers running into significant problems on mobile commerce platforms often caused them to abandon their online shopping carts. In many cases, platforms failed to store product information properly, causing consumers to abandon their digital shopping carts and start the process from the beginning.

Poor shopping experience cause consumers to drop mobile commerce

The report shows that some 51% of consumers opted to abandon their digital shopping carts because of security reasons. These people did not believe that a mobile commerce platform would be capable of keeping their financial information safe.  Some 47% abandoned carts because of difficulties regarding mobile payments, while 41% claimed that a mobile commerce platform they were using was simply too difficult to manage. Another 23% of consumers reported that their transactions would not go through during the checkout process, causing them to seek out more convenient forms of shopping.