TSR Newsletter | February 22, 2021
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-- The Stinger Report: Service Message --
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The Global Digital Out-Of-Home Entertainment (DOE) Sector covered in The Stinger Report .
Wishing all our subscribers, famlies, loved ones, (and those serving) stay safe and well.
Kevin Williams
Publisher, The Stinger Report (TSR)
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Virtual Amusement Business
Part 1 | # 1058
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In The Stinger Report #1058 – This issue covers in detail:
1. The dependence on Virtual Conferences grows, with the first major trade events for the year held via online streaming – seeing the first Foundations Entertainment University (FEU) hold the class of #53, and incorporate a new facility visit element before a unique behind the scenes look on actual new FEC projects in development.
2. The latest conference to support the FEC sector opened its doors with a three-day gathering of leading industry luminaries at ShowUp. This was an event that saw several of products launches from LAI Games, Raw Thrills, VRsenal and others.
3. Coinciding with the ShowUp event, and major announcements regarding business developments were made from SPREE Interactive, alongside the acquisition of SpringboardVR by a major VR development house, namely Vertigo Games.
4. Coverage of some of the keynote seminar sessions streamed at ShowUp are also covered in this exclusive look at the event and assessments made of the new developments, along with new announcements made. All in this first part…
….and much, much more!
- The Stinger Report, published by KWP and its director, Kevin Williams, as the leading interactive Out-of-Home Entertainment news-and-views resource, covering the immersive frontier and beyond.
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Going into 2021, it was inevitable that actual physical trade events would not be viable – no matter how much wishful thinking, cautious minds overruled enthusiasm, and the first major trade events would be held virtually. We have already covered the CES event in detail, and now we move to the more amusement and attraction trade focused virtual offerings that took place in the early part of the year. Within this we are given a glimpse of the means undertaken to keep the flame of community business alive.
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- First of Year Amusement Virtual Gatherings – Part 1
The first major trade event of the 2021 calendar saw Foundations Entertainment University (FEU) # FEC bootcamp seminar program (Class of #53), the first of the year – with the event promoting a new Virtual Road Show format. Dealing with a virtual conference program, the new format also included a unique “behind the scenes” video tour of two leading FEC locations. One being the ‘Fourth Dimension Fun Center’, Maryland, and the other a revealing tour of the currently nearing completion ‘XTREME Play’ facility in Connecticut. FEU gathered leading speakers on the various issues of opening and operating a family entertainment business (including Stinger Report owner KWP). This especially included logistics under the current trying conditions, and saw leading sponsorship from manufacturers and service providers. And proving the continued interest in establishing FEC business, the event saw over 100 attendees during the two-day course.
This event was followed, a few weeks later, by the first in a brand new trade event with ShowUp. The ambitious three-day event, held on a virtual online conference and exhibition platform, saw some 80 global innovators and businesses present during the three days, supported by some 40 exhibitors in the “Virtual Trade Show”. The conference days were set up to first focus on new revenue streams, business models, and go-to-market strategies. The second day was set to cover the impact of emerging technology on entertainment attractions. And finally, to delve into changing consumer trends, and look towards the future of the FEC sector. The timing of the event seemed perfect, as several high-profile announcements coincided.
Stinger Report owner KWP was invited to present in two sessions, the first on 'How Emerging Tech Will Change FECs Forever' – as moderator with HP and Backlight, touching on the new developments in the market and what we can look forward to. Along with the tech trends, a far-reaching session also covered the future of VR in location-based venues – moderated by Redemption Plus and seeing speakers from the operator side, such as from Andy B’s and Ctrl-V; and then from the manufacturer’s standpoint, with Virtuix and exhibitor LAI, looking at the impact that the health crisis had on the deployment of this tech in entertainment and the fundamentals that are shaping the plans for the market’s re-emergence.
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Great panellist, on a great Virtual Session
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The second session with KWP was on 'Conversations on Race: Being Black in Location-Based Entertainment' – with prominent members of the diverse entertainment market. This session focused on the need for inclusivity and diversity in an industry that prides itself on how it treats its members. These were just some of the interesting sessions and carousel presentations taking place during the days which we will touch on later (for those who missed the conference element of the event, the organizers hope to make available recordings of each – watch this space.)
Regarding the virtual trade show element, ShowUp highlighted many new developments. Several key exhibitors at the virtual event chose what looks like the only major amusement show front until later in the year to launch new products. Exhibitors and sponsors on the Virtual Expo floor included LAI Games, with a major announcement for their 700+ selling VR amusement ride. ‘Virtual Rabbids: The Big Ride’ is now selling as “The Big Bundle”, combining all the components created for the platform over the last few years, including all six passive and interactive ride experiences, the special ‘Hygiene Kit’ with sanitizing wipes and trash bin seamlessly integrated into the game, and a full marketing kit including signage and consumables – all combined into a single package at a special price. For existing owners, the company is offering the ‘Big Expansion Pack’ and its three additional ride experiences at a discount of 50-percent off, as well as discounted Factory Refurbished HTC Vive headsets. LAI Games announced they will be hosting a dedicated showcase of their new games for 2021, set to be held in March.
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The fully stuffed “Big Bundle” version of ‘Virtual Rabbids’ [LAI Games]
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No stranger to virtual events, UNIS Technology supported the ShowUp virtual trade event exhibition. The company had found great success with its VR motorcycle racer, ‘Ultra Moto VR’, and was offering a discount of some $500 in support of the event. But the company was also showing its other new platforms, revealed at the UNIS Showcase last year.
Regarding news of this VR motion-seat amusement piece – this genre of system has fathered a few surrogates. For example with TRIOTECH and ‘STORM’ and, on the ShowUp floor, Raw Thrills’ ‘King Kong of Skull Island VR’ (the production prototype covered in the AmuseExpo’20 report). The final system features the two-seat AirRide motion system, high-end HP gaming CPUs, and twin HP Reverb 2 UHD headsets. The press release announced the start of production of ‘King Kong of Skull Island VR’ in late January, revealed that the first production run for the new Raw Thrills VR platform had already sold out, a promising omen that this style of VR amusement was still in favour with operators. Amusement distributors Betson Enterprise, BANDAI NAMCO Amusement Europe and Warehouse of Games, reported to have been actively promoting ‘King Kong of Skull Island VR’ to their clients as a high-performing, yet cost-effective attraction in their allotted territories.
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The production version of ‘King Kong of Skull Island VR’ [Raw Thrills]
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Speaking of UK distributor BANDAI NAMCO Amusement Europe, and our friends at Arcade Heroes pointed our attention to a new Videmption piece that was being released through their auspices in Europe. Developed by Adrenaline Amusements, ‘Zombie Smasher’ reuses the cabinet deployed for the fun ball throwing video screen game, ‘Blox Breaker’. Now with the new zombie styling, the game has the player using their balls to fend off waves of the undead in a fun, fast paced game, favoring a more arcade game style than conventional redemption. We hope to learn more about this new addition to the popular range of Videmption titles from the company.
ShowUp had exhibitor Rilix and the company was one of the first entrants to approach the two-rider passive VR amusement and mall experience as a rental and machine purchase opportunity on ‘Riflix Coaster’. The Stinger Report covered their increased sales activity in our IAAPA’19 feature and, during ShowUp, they were offering a discount deal on their machine. The popularity of this genre of VR was further underpinned with the appearance of a new release from Chinese manufacturer Owatch, with its ‘VR WOW’, incorporating many of the familiar features of the other machines (covered later in our report from the China show).
As previously touched on by The Stinger Report, VRstudios has been working hard on innovation, and is looking at the needs of the market under the current conditions. The company publicly promoted its new ‘Hoops Madness’, part of the VRstudios Sports line. The system is able to accommodate up-to-eight players and incorporates a persistent profile so the player can track their progress and scoring on the platform. It also incorporates the innovation of a home VR element, allowing players to hone their skills to later try out at the facility version. This is an innovative business model that links consumer with commercial deployment and build a competitive/eSports element into the revenue stream. These moves in eSports directions were mirrored in the ShowUp presentation stage, with several sessions including VRstudios joining operator GameWorks and others in a session looking at how eSports can play a part in the future of FEC business.
The VR enclosure sector was also represented at ShowUp in force, with HOLOGATE taking their space at the virtual event. Having a lot to shout about, the company has added to its extensive library of content with the new game ‘Slug Terra’, based on the animated series IP, and had added to an operational component with a brand new touch screen kiosk called the ‘Terminal’, that acts as both a promotional tool and ease of operation interface. But the big news surrounding HOLOGATE would not break until a few days after the show.
The company is already recognized as the global leader in immersive location-based entertainment systems, with its ‘HOLOGATE Arena’ and ‘HOLOGATE Blitz’ platforms. The company is now continuing its expansion into the amusement and attraction sector, with the amazing announcement that the team would be developing their own entertainment facility. Under the name ‘HOLOGATE WORLD’, this will be a “Extended Reality” entertainment venue, comprising HOLOGATE hardware, Escape Room, and eSport Arena, as well as a brand new line of proprietary experiences. The first facility will be located within the FLAIR urban marketplace in Fürth, Germany. Opening in September, this is expected to be the first in a series of ‘HOLOGATE WORLD’ sites. The developer is working with Stinger Report owner KWP on an advisory basis.
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The artist rending of part of the new facility [HOLOGATE]
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Another developer of a VR enclosure system supporting ShowUp was BoxBlast – the company was offering a special discount rate for the duration and revealed that they are creating some new developments for the platform which their R&D team was hard at work on, for an announcement in the coming weeks. A new VR amusement piece gaining its first official trade event airing was ‘Vader Immortal - Lightsaber Dojo’ from VRsenal. The company confirmed the rollout of the system internationally and, during the event, the company had a special offer of some 10-percent off the purchase price for the self-service VR kiosk. The operation was also sponsoring a break-out session with its first operator, Dave & Buster’s, along with content developer Nomadic to explain the thinking behind the platform.
With the sale of SpringboardVR, the founders and core team have launched a new company, ArborXR, which will be wholly focused on Enterprise business. This is a device management and content distribution platform that makes it easy for companies to scale XR deployments, bringing the same functionality they established in LBE. This includes developing their work previously covered in The Stinger Report, which was seen in action at BETT’20. This is the latest example of “Mergers and Acquisitions”, that illustrates the changing landscape in this sector.
Developments in the VR venue content sector continued, with announcements from SynthesisVR – developers of their own popular VR facility management and content distribution platform. The company had signed two new deals, including a partnership with Vietnamese Holomia, offering their update to the game ‘MISSIONX – VR Laser Tag’ – a frenetic, multi-player VR arena platform with three game modes, representing competitive, capture the flag, and deathmatch, available on Oculus Quest 2 for up-to-ten players. The developer uses SideQuest to provide a download, offering commercial use license for VR arcades. SynthesisVR’s other partnership announcement was with developer Beyond, launching the deathmatch shooter for up-to-eight players, ‘Oddball’, new to the platform.
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The operational ‘Mission to Mars’ installation in Germany [SPREE Interactive]
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At the same time, SPREE announced its investment to include an eSports element into its range – signing an agreement with VR Nerds to release an exclusive version of the smash VR competitive blaster, ‘Tower Tag’; along with adding an eSports element. The game has proven a strong title in the competitive VR scene, having been launched in SEGA venues in Japan, and pivoting towards a consumer VR release on the popular platforms. It is now available as an exclusive version to run on the SPREE free-roaming and mobile-setup installation for Western LBE and VR arcades. SPREE has been able to undertake most of this surge in effort through raising a EUR multimillion investment, seeing several prominent investors, all recognizing the value of the LBE sector, and supporting the expansion of the operation. This will be followed later in 2021 by a Series-A investment round that will fund a planned global expansion.
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In a session called “Gaining STEAM”, panellists included Laser City, creator of an online safe space for lockdown children ages 6-12, using the FEC staff to curate the space, focusing on fun and social elements. This is along with Drone Legends, utilizing aerial drones, coding in a learning program both in-person and virtually, and SPREE Interactive, as we already covered their work with ‘Mission to Mars’; along with CenterTech, famous for their VR center that has driven a curriculum-based second business model with their school group educational program, one of the first to define this approach in 2016. And rounding this off, VictoryXR, maker of educational environments recorded in spatial 3D, creating compelling and immersive education content, teaching in VR with over 240 experiences. The session was far reaching and touched on the need for transformational education for our new audience, and that entertainment is achieving an experiential approach, changing education in a dedicated shift to “Immersive Learning”.
Talking about the impact of drones and machine learning applications branching into FEC, and another panel session held during ShowUp revealed the influence that this new technology is having on entertainment opportunities. Drone Legends again revealed how their new educational platform was carrying on the experiential element, and that the guests loved this approach. While Drone Interactive covered how their unique amusement application of drone gaming and competition offered a new level of audience draw with their ‘Arcadrone’ system. The company has installed two systems and is in the process of rolling out across the market.
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The ‘Arcadrone’ system [Drone Interactive]
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Moving back to VR and another Arena-Scale non-backpack platform being rolled out was from Scale-1 Portal. The company has been working as one of the only official Oculus for Business program members from the commercial entertainment sphere (as in The Stinger Report, Amusement Expo 2020 coverage). Now finished, the new ‘VOXEL ARENA’ platform offers up-to-six players interactive entertainment across five different games, including the fun ‘Sep’s Diner’. The platform is being rolled out under a unique business model for operators, who buy their own Oculus Quest 2 VR hardware through the Oculus Business Edition program – under an exclusive agreement. This comes with a mandatory yearly maintenance and support fee (per unit).
Scale-1 Portal provides a subscription to its cloud-based software delivery portal, including access to the five game experiences and service support. Under the Oculus for Business agreement, the units do not require a Facebook login, an issue that has proven contentious with the consumer VR community. Scale-1 Portal installed the first units based on this business model at a Canadian venue during August 2020 – and hope to start rolling out across interested operators that want to adopt this unique cost-effective business approach. The standalone mobileVR headset approach was also presented from Pixnami with their ‘Hero Zone’ free-roaming VR adventure. The company has been covered in previous Stinger Report coverage of this genre.
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This concludes the first part of our coverage of the trade event season, the next part of this report will follow shortly.
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April 26-27
POSTPONED
2022
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March / May
POSTPONED
June 29 - July 1
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