This guide introduces GameSearch-AI, a digital scouting tool which provides intelligent advice for exploring land you're interested in hunting. We'll dive deep into how GameSearch works, exploring its features and design principles.
Firstly, GameSearch-AI is a website. There is no need to download anything to use it. At https://gamesearch-ai.com, you have access to the entire tool after you log in via a Google account! In this article, I'll refer GameSearch-AI either using the name 'GameSearch-AI', 'GameSearch', or simply 'the app'.
GameSearch is a tool that uses artificial intelligence in order to analyze the land of your choice. By artificial intelligence, I basically mean that it uses ChatGPT! GameSearch itself currently doesn't do any fancy statistics. Instead, all GameSearch does is send off a request, AKA a 'prompt' to a large language model (LLM) which does its very best to act as a hunting expert for you.
The information sent to the LLM is a package containing map imagery and some instructions. While it seems too simple, the insane improvements of LLMs and artificial intelligence lets us analyze any land you want as long as we can pull information about it. We essentially rely on the world's data captured by LLM providers such as Google, OpenAI and others to be able to ask nuanced questions about hunting in your area.
GameSearch's primary goal at the end of the day is to display high quality potential hunting locations on a map of your chosen land. To do this, the app relies on structured data provided directly from the AI/LLM. In addition, we also rely on the LLM to generate overviews of the land and recommendations for people hunting.
GameSearch-AI is designed to be simple and intuitive. It's a flow that is just a few steps long in order to get some ideas for ideal hunting spots on your land.
1. Log in with a Google Account. You can log into the website by heading to the Sign In page. You can also find various links on the website including the home page, the footer and the top right.
2. Enter your settings on the 'Analysis' page. Once you are logged in, it should bring you to the Analysis page. The analysis page contains settings that you need to configure in order to use the tool effectively. The key settings are simply your desired species and your location. There are also other advanced settings below that can help improve the accuracy of your analysis. Hit 'GO' to proceed to the map and hone in on your location.
- Species: This is the targeted species that you want to hunt! Our current list is White-tailed deer, Mule deer, Elk, Moose, Turkey, Bear, Coyote, Grey Squirrels and Cottontail Rabbits.
- Location: This is the starting point of the map. You can zoom and pan once you're there. This location gets saved locally for you so that you can pull it back up.
- Advanced Settings - Number of generations: This option allows you to generate multiple attempts at finding hunting spots. This is helpful because it allows you to get multiple takes on the land to see if there are common locations, or if perhaps one generation has more convincing spots than the others. LLMs are not perfect and can report inconsistent locations and write descriptions that don't tell you as much as you might want. You will be charged one credit per generation.
- Advanced Settings - Expected season: Selecting your hunting season (Fall, Spring, Winter, etc) can help the AI give you the best results relevant to the weather and other conditions. If this isn't specified, it will give generic advice regarding hunting season, or assume a season for you.
- Advanced Settings - Expected time of day: Selecting the time of day that you are going to be out can improve accuracy because animals behave differently depending on conditions at different time of day. If this isn't specified, the LLM can give generic results or assume a time of day.
- Advanced Settings - Accessible locations: The LLM can give suggested locations that are close to parking and roads if this is selected. It may not always be accurate.
- Advanced Settings - Additional information: Here's where you enter any additional information that you might have, or if you want to shift how the AI responds in some way. An example would be if it's summer and the map has streams, the LLM might assume the streams are running when in fact they are dry. You can let it know that the streams are dry and it may change the results.
3. Zone in on your land. If your settings are all ready, click 'GO' to head to the map. You can toggle between satellite, terrain and street maps. If you need to adjust your settings, use the 'Edit Search' button. Be aware the on this page, you are selecting the land that you want to send over to the AI. By default, the AI will send of the currently viewed map image to the AI when you hit the 'ANALYZE' button. Don't worry about getting the resolution perfect, the optimal resolution will be determined behind the hood. You can adjust the captured land to be more of exactly what you want by using the 'Select Area' button within the map region and dragging the box to your location. This is useful if you want to make sure you only capture the public land in the view, or if you want just your plot.
- Click on a spot to open up a description of the location. It's very important that you study the description of the location to get a full idea of the spot the AI is truly referring to.- While spots placed on the map are often accurate, they can be placed slightly off, or in actuality the AI can be referring to a larger area.- When you export to OnX, feel free to adjust the market to sit at a spot that makes more sense to you with respect to the description the AI provides.
- Export your results by downloading a ".gpx" file. GPX files can be directly imported into OnX! You can also screenshot the results, or save it as a PDF in your browser. More sharing options coming soon!
- If you added more than one generation, change the generation you're looking at by clicking on numbered buttons at the bottom of the generation.
- Recommendations can be very helpful to keep in mind safety and important strategic ideas for scouting and hunting the land. Be aware that exploring new land for the first time and trying to hit points recommended by the AI can be very physically challenging. Use your own knowledge and recommendations to get the best plan for hitting these points.
My name is Paul D'Antonio and I am a solo developer working on GameSearch. I am a professional software engineer and hunting is a major passion of mine. That being said, GameSearch is certainly not perfect and is built to my likings, hoping that others might enjoy it too. If you have an idea, you find a bug, or want to chat about GameSearch please contact me directly via email, or on socials.
GameSearch-AI as of the writing of this article is in beta mode! Because the app is being tested, it is completely free for you to use. I have added limits on how many times people can use it to keep costs in control. If you want more credits to use GameSearch, please contact me and I can manually add credits to your account. The absolute best way to contact me is to tag GameSearch in a post on social media, I'll be so happy that you did. Alternatively you can contact me directly. Thanks for reading about GameSearch-AI!!