Commentary
How free-roaming VR shapes retail customer experience
Ambitious retail venues are embracing free-roaming VR to enhance entertainment value.
November 1, 2021 by Kevin Williams
The next phase of virtual reality entertainment is taking shape in many retail and mall locations, a global endeavor. Many massive undertakings are employing "hyper reality" — as seen with the Backlight "Oz Experience" at Area15 in Las Vegas.
Backlight also revealed a partnership with Wanadev on the Octopod platform, and with Vertogo Arcade on the Haze platform, to offer full free-roam VR in a turnkey package to independent operators. The company has already released its VR escape game content through VR platforms such as SynthesisVR and SpringboardVR for single tethered VR pod deployment, but now with the next phase of investment from VR venues comes access to full free-roaming packages.
At the same time, Hologate, a manufacturer of tethered VR enclosures, has been working on a platform based on a proprietary hyper reality streamed VR system which alleviates the need for the traditional heavy PC backpack and achieves high-end experience with full free-roaming immersion.
The four-player system, called the Hologate-X platform will be running the in-house developed game "Sigvried: Escape from Valhalla" — with the VR adventure employing physical 4D effects such as scent and wind, with THX 5.1 surround sound and highly detailed special tracking married to these physical and virtual effects. The ability to stream quality hyper reality free-roaming adventures greatly reduces the cost and operation and marks a new phase in the evolution of the experience.
Here comes Harry Potter
Not to be outdone is Harry Potter New York, a 21,000-square-foot themed retail experience based around the collections of Harry Potter and Fantastic Beasts merchandise and props in Warner Bros retail destinations. Developed in partnership with WarnerMedia, alongside Dreamscape Immersive, Wevr and Keylight, two experiences, called "Chaos at Hogwarts" and "Wizards Take Flight," are special VR adventures based in the Wizarding World of the franchise, with guests charged $34 each to try these 15-minute experiences.
"Chaos at Hogwarts" sees six guests using VR headsets and backpacks, adventuring in a free-roam style experience. Meanwhile, 'Wizards Take Flight' has six guests seated on motion systems which represent their personal broomsticks, soaring through the action with hand tracking.
This marks a new departure for Dreamscape, which had been avidly establishing its VR location based entertainment business before the global lockdown. This partnership with WarnerMedia allows the company to apply its VR expertise in both free-roaming backpack PC, and in seated motion simulation, as seen with Dreamworks Dragons Flight Academy, which was deployed at some Dreamscape venues before the lockdown.
Temporary VR on the move
The deployment of temporary VR entertainment installations continued apace with the installation of Roto VR's unique virtual reality peripheral system. The Roto VR Chair allows users to progress through the virtual environment, with movements mimicked by the sophisticated rotations of the chair through the patented head tracking technology. The experience is unlike any other of the VR chair systems and has primarily sold to the consumer VR scene.
However, the company has also developed a unique enclosure that offers four chairs for players to pay to use. The first example of this installation was launched in the Selfridges department store in London, and now the company has installed a four-chair enclosure using Oculus Quest 2 to supply the VR experiences at the Westfield London shopping mall.
The ability to offer a seated VR experience, using immersive tracking, is a drawing point for the achievement of a compelling experience.
Illluminarium raises the bar
Haptics plays a part in the launch of the new Illuminarium Experiences entertainment facility. The first 8,000-square-foot center to open in Atlanta later in the year will comprise 162 linear floor transducers and 12 Quattrocanali DSP+D amplifiers from Powersoft that will complement the immersive experiences.
Following Illuminarium Experiences' raising of $100 million in funding back in June, more meat is placed on the bone of the plans for their ambitious 30-venue rollout. The immersive entertainment venue developer has already started, with the soon-to-open flagship 26,000-square-foot Atlanta site. This will be followed by a 30,000-square-foot Las Vegas venue scheduled for a winter 2021 opening, part of the Area15 entertainment hub, and Miami site for 2022, all under construction.
Details were also revealed for an even more ambitious Illuminarium proposal to redevelop Chicago's iconic Navy Pier. The concept art depicts Illuminarium Chicago as a multi-level venue in a striking glass structure designed by architectural firm Rockwell Group.
Offering an immersive reality experience without the need for virtual reality hardware, Illuminarium proposes a compelling and immersive multi-sensory experience, employing Panasonic 4K laser projection and haptic transducers.
The first experience for this venue will be "Wild: The World's First Virtual Safari," a 50-minute show created for the immersive space, with other pieces in development that will build on the basic experience (suggested to cost $15 million each to develop). The venues also propose to be event spaces and are looking at other utilizations for the immersive areas, including as an educational platform. Along with the news regarding Chicago, sources revealed ongoing discussions towards a Mexico City venue starting development.
Food-and-fun expands its role
The continued expansion of the food-n-fun sector is placed into perspective with the news of Dave & Buster's opening its 141st location, marking the second venue in Seattle. The 40,000-square-foot facility will comprise the mix of amusement, redemption and sports bar, with dining that has come to signify the D&B brand. The corporation marks this as the beginning of the road to recovery for the operation that had to furlough staff and close operations during the worst of the lockdown.
Another example is the announcement from Merlin Entertainment to open a Legoland Discovery Centre in Belgium's capital at the Docks Bruxsel shopping center. This 3,000-square-foot facility is scheduled for a mid-2022 opening and will comprise the signature attractions and hospitality supporting the toy brand — with representatives stating that the site will include new "next-generation" attractions. Merlin operates some 30 chained entertainment stores internationally — looking to expand to 33 sites by 2024.
Strategies to utilize retail space have also seen an interest in new advertising technology. The explosion in the technological advances in 4K full-color LED displays has seen impressive presentations using the technology, especially in the digital out-of-home advertising sector.
Most recently, we have seen a spate of social media postings presenting "forced perspective" curved LED advertising displays, with amazing pseudo-3D CGi animations. The popularity of this technology has been crossing Asia, with the large displays in China, and recently the "Giant Cat" 4K display at Shinjuku station in Tokyo. It was only a matter of time for this to make landfall in the West.
London recently became the first major Western city to have its own display, with the iconic Piccadilly Circus receiving a giant "force perspective" display on its famous screens, now converted to 4K LED and advertising a giant CGi wristwatch to the passing crowds.
The London display, known as the Piccadilly Lights, is a famous capital landmark, originally a vast illuminated advertising hording from 1908, becoming a screen-based display in 1968. Immersive displays, such as "force perspective" screens, are expected to continue their popularity to the rest of the West as the DOOH sector updates its technology.
(Editor's note: Extracts from this blog are from recent coverage in The Stinger Report, published by KWP and its director, Kevin Williams, the leading interactive out-of-home entertainment news service covering the immersive frontier and beyond.)
About Kevin Williams
Along with advisory positions with other entrants into the market he is founder and publisher of the Stinger Report, “a-must-read” e-zine for those working or investing in the amusement, attractions and entertainment industry. He is a prolific writer and provides regular news columns for main trade publications. He also travels the globe as a keynote speaker, moderator and panelist at numerous industry conferences and events. Author of “The Out-of-Home Immersive Entertainment Frontier: Expanding Interactive Boundaries in Leisure Facilities,” the only book on this aspect of the market, with the second edition scheduled for a 2023 release.
More From CommentaryMore
Related Media
Subscribe
Get the latest news and resources from Vending Times.
Recent Posts
