I have always liked the idea of augmented reality apps, hold up your device and find cool stuff around you from places to eat right down to places to stay. I was a big fan of using Wikitude back in the day so when I saw ARKick in BlackBerry World I had to give it a go. The app is put together by Refocus Labs who has built the app for BlackBerry first instead of going Android or iOS and they've laid claim to being the first contextual augmented reality app. If you're not familiar with AR apps, maybe their description will help explain a bit further:

ARKick helps you find the best places around you using contextual factors like weather, time, temperature and also popular personalized places through social networks. Apart from showing places, the user can get information like time to reach the place, directions in a map view, an option to call, ratings and other essential information. 

Having used apps like ARKick before, I decided to see how it would compare to some other apps and I was honestly surprised as to how much information it was pulling in, even in my small neighborhood. The app is powered by the newly-launched Wikitude SDK for BlackBerry 10. To coincide with the launch, Wikitude has graduated their own Places app out of beta as well. The only real downside I can see in the app for some would be the pricing as it's currently set at $2.99.

That's a bit high for something you might not use all the time or just want to give a go of. We'll see if we can get a hands-on video up for you all shortly but if you're wanting to try it out already, ARKick is available now for all BlackBerry 10 smartphones through BlackBerry World.

Learn more / Purchase ARKick

Read more