The Growth of Location-Based Immersive Team Video Games

UK-based Immersive Gamebox has been bringing interactive play to venues, first in London and now in the U.S., where the company is currently in about 20 markets including New York, San Jose, Dallas, Denver and Salt Lake City. The goal is to expand to 100 stateside locations by 2025. Teams engage in social play in interactive smart rooms, taking part in adventures based on IP that so far includes about a dozen titles, including “Squid Game” and “Angry Birds.” Players are outfitted with 3D motion-tracking visors and touchscreens, eliminating the need for headsets.

“The concept behind Immersive Gamebox is to play interactive games that are based around social fun, teamwork and group experiences,” writes RLI.

CEO and co-founder Will Dean tells Wired he “became really interested in this idea of taking the dynamics of a video game, which is the individual versus the environment, and creating something that’s all about team bonding.”

Drawing on inspiration from formats like the original Nintendo Wii, Dean started developing “a smart game room that would use projection, motion tracking, and lidar,” Wired writes. His first prototype, which debuted in 2018, was a version of “Pong” in which the players themselves functioned as “paddles.”

When he began raising capital, investors were interested in the idea of “easy-to-assemble game rooms that they could build locations around or franchise to others, what Dean began calling ‘a theme park in a box,’” Wired writes. The first U.S. location, at Dallas’ Grandscape entertainment complex, was operated remotely when the London group found itself stuck at home due to COVID-19.

While the Interactive Gamebox, at first glance, looks like a volume stage lined with screens, “they’re actually simple white walls onto which a projector in the ceiling casts images,” explains Wired, noting that “cameras in the corners pick up movement from sensors on the visors worn by each player.”

Those movements can function as “interactive inputs, such as jumping on a specific spot in the room or touching a spot on a wall, as if the games are responding to button presses,” Wired says. The company’s original games have titles like “Temple of Coins” and “Shaun the Sheep,” although the company also licenses IP for development. The games are operated by an employee using an iPad or web interface, working outside of the cube or even remotely from offsite.

The games are for players 5 and up, and geared toward family entertainment, accommodating two to six players. “Each player wears a different-colored visor that corresponds to their onscreen avatar, and the games last anywhere from 15 to 60 minutes,” Wired reports, noting that “an hour of gameplay costs about $30 to $35, depending on the location.”

Another company, Sandbox VR, is also operating location-based experiences using popular titles including “Star Trek,” according to Variety, which last month reported a partnership with Netflix to create another VR experience based on “Squid Game.”

No Comments Yet

You can be the first to comment!

Leave a comment

You must be logged in to post a comment.