iMyth

Tag: Immersive experience

  • Dreamscape Immersive opens “Alien Zoo”

    Dreamscape Immersive opens “Alien Zoo”

    Yesterday, Dreamscape Immersive opened it’s first location-based immersive experience, “Alien Zoo”. It is open now through March 2. This project has been hidden up until now so no real information is available at this moment in time. Until I have an opportunity to experience it for myself, we’ll need to depend on the reports from fellow explorers.

    What I do know can be found on their website, http://www.dreamscapeimmersive.com/index.html. The participants can share their experience with up to six others and should take about 40 minutes. I don’t know if the layout will be an open sand box or if you will be confined to a specific platform. The concept art suggest the group will be bound to a motion controlled vehicle which will tilt and swivel in place as the platform guides the participants through the experience. Participants will be equipped with backpack computer and head mounted display, gloves and shoe coverings. These components tell me that Dreamscape Immersive is utilizing Vicon tracking technology to not only track HMDs but also hands and feet and most probably waist movement as well. This means participants will be able to see and observe their own avatars as well as observe and potentially interact with the avatars of other participants. Because of the Vicon tracking participants will be able to interact with props and sets and, potentially, interactors within the experience.  The interactors are teased as Megaraffes, giant brontosaurus-like giraffes, Frogcats, which should drive merchandising wild and the spider-like Sicari which will add a bit of interactive danger to the experience.

    As mentioned, this experience will be using Vicon tracking technology. This should deliver a truer one to one physical experience than the Void’s “Secrets of the Empire”. Instead of tracking head and gun position and partially tracking hands, Dreamscape Immersive should be able to lock on to a physically accurate interactive experience with everything in the environment. This sounds really interesting! Also of note, Dreamscape Immersive provides specially tracked wheel chairs for physically impaired participants. This sounds like a great way to include handicapped folks and have them integrate naturally with the experience. This is a very interesting approach to the throughput puzzle.

     

    I am very excited to test this new experience out! It will only be around for a few weeks and no doubt be replaced by another groovy interactive experience. Way to go gang!

     

     

  • Greenlight’s VR Industry Revenue Predictions

    Greenlight’s VR Industry Revenue Predictions

    According to Greenlight, more than 65{76c5cb8798b4dc9652375d1c19c86d53c1d1411f4e030dd406aa284e63c21817} of all VR revenue will come from headset sales this year. The anticipated revenue from VR this year is $7.17B. This is expected to grow to $72.82B by the beginning of 2021.

    On a note more related to iMyth, Greenlight forecasts that location-based immersive experiences is going to grow into a significant part of the industry. In 2017, location-based VR will bring in $222M worldwide; by 2021, that amount will grow to almost $1.2B. This is a great place for iMyth to be in.

  • Knott’s Berry Farm; Showdown in Ghost Town

    Knott’s Berry Farm; Showdown in Ghost Town

    I love Knott’s Berry Farm. When living in Southern California I looked forward to every opportunity to visit the nation’s first theme park. Although the rides were definitely geared for smaller kids and were not as high-adrenalin as what could be found at Cedar Point or Six Flags, they park always had a low keyed, pleasant atmosphere around it.

    Knott’s Berry Farm, as part of thew Cedar Fair conglomerate, has take its own step into the location based, immersive experience market. Its VR Showdown In Ghost Town is a multiplayer VR experience that costs $6 in addition to the cost of your ticket. It pays homage to the park’s  19th century western theme but with a 21st century twist. IN a nutshell the experience is three minutes long where the participant plays a law keeper in an old west town trying to stop time traveling robots. Luckily the bad guys are not Zombies but there are similarities to other shot-em ups such as Zero Latency.

    The experience is wireless as the participant is equipped with only a toy gun and an head mounted display device. The tracking is done with Optitrack cameras which track the headsets and the toy guns.

    The refresh rate is only 60 frames per second which will be noticeably slower than the 90 frames per second experienced with the HTC Vive or Oculus Rift. I have not goner through the experience myself but initial experiences report blurring and thick black lines outside the display area in different headsets.

    Many amusement parks are venturing into virtual reality to beef up their existing rides. Similar to the Void and Zero Latency, this is an early attempt to get the public involved with larger than life experiences that can not be found in the home. While I am dismayed the experience developers chose yet another “Shoot-em-Up” experience, I am encouraged with the acceptance of this new form of media by location based venues such as amusement parks.