The State of XR in the Amusement Industry

by Bob Cooney

This is the 10th anniversary of VR’s beginning in the amusement industry. The year 2015 saw the emergence of Zero Latency and The VOID, two of the most revolutionary entertainment concepts of the last 40 years. While The VOID didn’t emerge from the pandemic, Zero Latency continues its rapid expansion with 120 sites across six continents and opening multiple new locations each month. Today the technology has solidified around industry standards, and there’s a proliferation of quality content and solutions from dozens of companies.

Technology

I’ve opted to use the term XR instead of VR in the title. I’ve been a staunch holdout, some would call a purist, about virtual reality over the various other flavors of “reality” being peddled by the tech industry. But over the last year, things have shifted. Meta, HTC VIVE and Pico have all released new headsets featuring “mixed reality,” where the physical world is projected into your vision via onboard stereoscopic cameras.

Augmented reality always held promise, but the hardware was expensive, fragile and not suited to location-based entertainment operations. However, Verse Immersive from Enklu then came to IAAPA with a Microsoft HoloLens-powered, walk-through experience, which ran in more than a dozen locations, including two Main Event sites.

Then Snap Spectacles unveiled their latest development kit at the VR Attraction Summit, promising a next-generation platform for augmented reality glasses that could cater to the LBE market.

The tech industry combines VR, MR, and AR under the term XR, for Extended Reality. It’s not a consumer-friendly term, but in the B2B world, it’s been accepted as a category. Over the next several years, you can expect to see an increase in the implementation of mixed and augmented reality solutions in the market. These won’t replace VR, which remains the go-to technology for fully immersive experiences. They will open up entirely new categories of experiences that attract broader audiences.

Headsets

Last year, HTC VIVE had the LBE industry locked up. Its Vive Pro was featured in most high-end PCVR cabinets, and the Focus 3 was the de facto standard for free-roam attractions. How a year can change things.

DPVR, a Chinese company with years of experience manufacturing headsets for the Chinese market, broke into the Western market when Raw Thrills featured it in their Godzilla VR game. Operators (and I) were initially dubious, but over time, the headset proved its worth. It was lighter, had a wider field of view, and wasn’t any less reliable than the heavier and more expensive VIVE product.

When LAI Games showcased it as an upgrade to its Virtual Rabbids game, featuring a steel cable solution that promised a longer lifespan than any cable to date, the industry had to take notice. Now, DPVR has a grip on the arcade cabinet market.

Pico, which all but abandoned the LBE market when Bytedance acquired them in 2021 in a feeble attempt to compete with Meta in the consumer market, came roaring back last fall with the Pico 4 Ultra Enterprise Edition. It’s an all-in-one sporting a more powerful processor than the VIVE, in addition to lighter-weight pancake optics, and better full-color passthrough. Oh, and it’s half the price of HTC’s flagship. It’s been eating away at market share, with most free-roam companies now recommending it as the number one option.

Generation Alpha

Gen Alpha (kids 15 and under) is the first generation to grow up with Roblox, VR headsets in classrooms, and immersive games as the norm. For them, virtual reality isn’t a novelty any more than tablets are to you. They flock to virtual coasters, at up to $10 for three minutes. I can’t even count the number of times I’ve seen a dad holding his 4-year-old up on a UNIS Ultra Moto VR while the kid’s face shows rapt delight. I can assure you that wasn’t Dad’s idea. Kids love VR.

But operators are still slow to adopt free-roam VR. They might still be suffering PTSD from all those 4-player tethered VR systems that earned like crazy from 2017 until the post-pandemic labor shortages drove wages through the roof, leaving them unattended and gathering cobwebs. But free roam is a different beast. It’s cheap, easy to operate, and way more reliable (if you get the right system). It also demands a premium price, and when run properly, it exceeds laser tag in revenue per square foot. It’s also way cooler.

Free roam VR is more than “just another attraction,” said Sebastian Malavasi, co-founder and CEO of Hero Zone. “It’s a premium, social experience that drives higher ticket prices and significant revenue.” (Read more about Hero Zone in this month’s Cover Story on page 45.)

Free-roam VR is the ultimate immersive experience, pulling in Gen A families for birthdays, repeat visits, and the kind of social buzz that classics like laser tag, bowling, and mini-golf struggle to generate.

Games and Attractions

While some operators remain resistant to virtual reality, their number is dwindling. It’s hard to ignore the success of Virtual Rabbids from LAI, Godzilla from Raw Thrills, and even SpongeBob VR Bubble Coaster from Andamiro and Rilix. There are thousands of those in the field, and they are usually among the top 5 games in most locations. Sure, they require more maintenance than operators prefer to deal with. But nobody complains about filling a plush crane multiple times a day when it’s earning. Expect to see more VR on more cabinets over the next few years.

Kids will ride coasters again and again. Adults, however, tend to be one-and-done. Enter interactive VR turret shooters like Godzilla Kaiju Wars VR and UNIS’ Sailor’s Quest, which put theme park-quality experiences in every arcade. Sega’s follow-up to its VR Agent shooter, Alpha Ops VR Strike, utilized the same handheld gun but placed it on a seated, 2-player motion base. And VR drivers like LAI’s Asphalt 9: Legends are earning extremely well, too. Expect future VR cabinets to follow this trend, with creative shooting and driving controls bolted onto motion bases for thrilling, immersive, and interactive entertainment.

While the unattended VR game category is growing, the VR attraction space is experiencing explosive growth. From compact free-roam gaming and VR escape rooms that fit up to six players in as little as 300 sq. ft., to anchor attractions like Zero Latency that command as much as $50 per player, VR is continuing to be leveraged to attract new audiences and drive revenue. (See the story on VR escape rooms on page 53 and a 10th anniversary feature on Zero Latency on page 55.)

Tell Me a Story

In my opinion, the biggest story in location-based VR is the emergence of what’s being called “Large-Scale Free-Roam Storytelling Experiences.” Hopefully, that name doesn’t stick. These are often in spaces of 10,000 sq. ft. and accommodate 100 people at a time. The experiences range from 15 minutes up to an hour. And they’re consistently generating seven figures in revenue per location.

A growing number of companies are developing experiences in this space. Excurio in Paris, Univrse from Barcelona, Wevr in California, and Felix and Paul from Montreal are some of the leaders in this fast-emerging market. They’re not games, but the best ones have interactive elements. They lean heavily on art, culture and storytelling, which appeals to a vast audience. Parents feel good about taking their kids to learn about art, culture and history. And groups, from schools to seniors, are flocking to them.

World-class museums, such as the Prado in Madrid, the Louvre in Paris and the Dali Museum in Tampa, have all utilized VR to expand their audience and enable people to connect more deeply with both the artist and their art. But what started in the art world is moving towards more mainstream entertainment.

Felix and Paul partnered with Phi Studio and have toured The Infinite, a free-roam experience that takes guests to a virtual version of the International Space Station, available around the world. Their upcoming 20,000-sq.-ft. Interstellar Arc free roam will be a permanent fixture at Area15 in Las Vegas later this year. And Univrse and Banijay Entertainment have announced a large-scale free-roam experienced based on the Netflix hit series Black Mirror, coming in Q4 this year. Other studios are looking at this space too.

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To stay up to date on this and other trends in immersive entertainment, make sure to subscribe to the Inside VR newsletter at www.thevrcollective.com. Meanwhile, turn the page – and then some – for a selection of articles about VR in the amusement business today.

Bob Cooney is a global speaker, moderator, and futurist covering extended realities and the metaverse. Widely considered the leading expert on location-based virtual reality, his mission is to prepare the industry for the change coming as these and other emerging technologies begin impacting every aspect of our business and lives. Founder of the VR Arcade Game Summit at Amusement Expo and the VR Collective distribution alliance, he has recently combined those and other efforts into LEXRA, a trade association built for the VR and related technology ecosystem from tech developers to attraction operators with education, museums and more. Learn more about LEXRAby visiting www.lexra.org. Follow Bob Cooney at www.bobcooney.com.