Immersive Fort Tokyo, a new theme park featuring immersive experiences, has opened to the public in Tokyo’s Odaiba area.
Rooted in immersive theatre, the unique destination is home to 12 immersive attractions, as well as six shops and restaurants.
Osaka-based Katana, a marketing and entertainment firm focused on the Japanese theme park industry, is operating the new park.
Katana CEO Tsuyoshi Morioka is known for reversing declining attendance at Universal Studios Japan in 2010.
Immersive Fort Tokyo is the first project of its kind in the world, with guests able to participate and interact as players rather than observers.
Highlights include a large-scale immersive theatre experience, a horror experience, and a show that suddenly debuts in a restaurant.
Also on offer is an escape room-style attraction where visitors must work together, a Sherlock Holmes experience, and a Jack the Ripper adventure.
“With immersive theatre, it’s your own entertainment, nobody else’s. You play the role,” Tomoe Okiyama, creative director of Immersive Fort Tokyo, told blooloop.
“I think that the depth of the memory that you get through immersive experiences is so much greater than from any other entertainment. Those are the factors that make them compelling.”
Taking theme park experiences to the next level
Senior art director T. Rick Hayashi said: “We want to be able to push people out of their daily lives to inhabit a different character here.
“We are unleashing the freedom of experiencing a different life. Being part of something like a murder mystery experience where you get to scream your head off is a great way to do that.”
In addition to Immersive Fort Tokyo, Katana is working to open a nature-inspired theme park on Okinawa’s main island in 2025.
The 60-hectare Junglia park will centre around the UNESCO World Nature Heritage registered ‘Yambaru’ subtropical forest region of Okinawa Prefecture.
