Point of Interest

This is an Augmented Reality Game trope. A Point of Interest is a real-world location that has a special purpose or function within the game world. Points of Interest are usually already locations of note within the real world -- water towers, monuments, churches and so on -- although it is not unlikely for easily-noticeable landmarks of low real importance to be used as well. This is most likely to aid the player in finding the sites.

Exactly how close a player needs to be to interact with the Point of Interest varies from game to game. Some may require the player to be practically standing on the location; others may require simple proximity, such as standing within 50 to 75 feet of the location's "pin" on the game map.

Naturally, this provides a possible revenue stream for the organization publishing the game; it is not uncommon for commercial enterprises to pay the game publisher to be a Point of Interest in order to attract potential customers.

Conversely, various solemn memorials ranging from the Hiroshima Memorial to the Holocaust Museum have asked to be removed, as the game is a distraction to their core mission.

Real Life Examples

 * Pokémon Go has at least three:
 * Pokéstops
 * Gyms
 * Nests
 * There are also Spawn points, if these are different from nests.
 * Harry Potter: Wizards Unite has three varieties:
 * Inns, where players can dine and regain Spell Energy, as well as deploy Dark Detectors to attract high-risk Traces.
 * Greenhouses, where they can find random potions ingredients or grow their own
 * Fortresses, where they can face difficult challenges for high rewards.
 * Additionally, there are markers -- displayed in-game as flags -- which indicate that a given area is prone to Traces of a particular Family.
 * Niantic's first game Ingress and its successor/reboot Ingress Prime both have Portals, which are typically associated with buildings and landmarks of historic or architectural significance -- such as sculptures, murals and other public art, libraries, post offices, memorials, places of worship, public transit hubs, parks, and other recreational or tourist spaces, or with business locations. Unlike other games, players may nominate potential Portals based on street art or other aesthetic features.
 * SpecTrek has temporary Points of Interest in the form of "ghosts" which are placed on the map at a distance from the player, who must walk to their location to scan and ultimately catch them.
 * Zombies, Run! has locations within the settlement of Abel Township where you must drop supplies while evading hordes of zombies.
 * A British firm called Scape Technologies is (as of 2019) developing a cloud-based, machine-readable 3D map which as part of the resulting platform for Augmented Reality Gaming (called Holoscape) will provide far more impressive and immersive points of interest. They hope to have something similar to Fortnite as the first game using it.

Anime and Manga

 * Den-noh Coil, being set in both reality and virtual reality, has a few. Shrines of any size cannot be entered by Searchys, which gives youngsters who are up to no good a place to hide. Also, the VR space that has a fixed entry point in the setting's real world.

Live-Action TV

 * A large number are scattered around the Spanish city of Granada for the Augmented Reality game at the center of the Korean series Memories of the Alhambra. By the end of the first episode you see a spawn point for a weapon and the encounter zone of what amounts to a Boss for the tutorial level.