The Walk Fitness App

The Walk is a fitness app aimed primarily at walkers. It works on Android and iPhones or even tablets – if you walk around with yours. The app is half pedometer and half gripping story. As you walk in real life you walk through an exciting thriller too. Walking unlocks new pieces of the story, encouraging you to want to walk even more. The walk was created by Six to Start and Naomi Anderson, the team behind the Zombies, Run! fitness app.

It all starts in Inverness Train Station when a bomb explodes and, after a case of mistaken identity, you are suddenly given an item that could save the world as we know it. You have to flee the station and start making your way South to Glasgow and England beyond. The story is probably best described as a techno-thriller with you playing Walker an innocent bystander who suddenly has a chance to save the world.

To play and unlock new story segments you just have to start an episode – and walk with your phone in your pocket or purse. You could also, run, bike, or do any other repetitive motion workout. The app keeps track of how long you've walked and new story clips unlock once you've walked far enough. Once you've unlocked a story clip click on it to listen to the audio drama.

The app stays on in the background of your phone serving as a pedometer. In fact, you can use it as just a pedometer if you really like. Six to Start says the app adapts to your level of fitness so it won't take you too long – or short – a time to get to new story segments. (This is a feature you can turn off.)

You can earn 3 achievements per episode:

• Did it in a Day: When you finish an episode in a single calendar day.

• Keep Moving: When you complete an episode without pausing for more than 3 hours at a time.

• 100%: When you find every landscape feature and Collectible in the episode.

Each episode is a new part of the story. At the beginning of an episode you can choose a longer or shorter path to the end. Choosing a longer path won't change the story, but it gives you a chance to get collectibles, which are objects that tell you more about the world, and bonus audio clips too. You can also click on landscape features as you move through the game. These are small white boxes that reveal more of what's around you when you click on them.

The Walk has over 65 episodes and more than 800 minutes of audio clips in it. Six to Start's aim is to provide you a good three months of game play and walking.

Challenges take place between some levels. In a Challenge you have to use your finger to draw a path between some sort of items on the screen. Your path has to take at least 30 minutes to walk. The more items you touch, the longer your path, and the greater an achievement you can earn:

• Bronze: Find 10 items

• Silver: Find 18 items

• Gold: Find 25 items

Exactly! It's more fun to walk or run when you're part of the story. But the app definitely is a pedometer too. It keeps track of both the steps you walk during an episode and over the course of a day. But what makes The Walk different from other pedometers is its game play and story arc. It's also fun to watch as you make your way through Scotland and England – that's another kind of reinforcement. “Wow, I walked from Inverness to Glasgow!”

If you want to give yourself a new kind of motivation for getting out and moving try The Walk. It definitely makes things more interesting when you're walking with bad guys on your tail. Six to Start got funding from the United Kingdom's Department of Health for this game for precisely that reason.