Frontgrid, an expert in adventure leisure and virtual reality attractions, has announced its first ParadropVR location in the United Kingdom.
The company’s latest installation can be found at Adventure Parc Snowdonia, in North Wales, enabling the venue to enhance its location-based entertainment offering with virtual reality.
Adventure Parc Snowdonia currently attracts over 150,000 visitors each year with its selection of adventure activities including an artificial surf wave experience and indoor aerial assault course.
“Forefront of competitive socialising”
Frontgrid CEO Matt Wells said: “After eighteen months of product development, it is very exciting to see ParadropVR Pod live on location and people coming off the ride and saying simply… “Wow”.
“From a customer experience point of view, there is simply nothing like it. It is exhilarating to play, you can choose your own character and take part in a global league. As the experience is multiplayer, you can literally fly with your friends and see them in the VR environment. It really is the forefront of competitive socialising.”
The Pod’s hardware compliments that of the existing ParadropVR Rize, which Frontgrid has now made accessible to the market for five years. Pod is a more compact version of the original product, featuring different games and styling.
A proven business model
Wells continues: “ParadropVR Rize is in ten countries around the world and counting, and is a proven business model. It is a spectacle attraction and a transformational solo experience, which is all about being the hero of your own journey and flying across diverse environments – while experiencing a large range of motion facilitated by the hardware.
“ParadropVR Pod has a different emphasis, it is designed to be more compact, is operatorless and being multiplayer has more of a focus on gameplay. It is positioned to be at the forefront of the esports phenomenon as it evolves.
“It can either be the main attraction at a location or offer more foyer-based entertainment, capitalising on existing footfall and monetising it by giving visitors something new to do in their dwell time. The Pod is getting a lot of attention across the spectrum of family entertainment centres, tourism destinations and retail and brand experiences.”
ParadropVR Pod features the “Discover” series of three games forming an immersive narrative experience; an inventor sends a team of adventurers careering over mountains equipped with high tech canopies and AR goggles to explore the environment. The eyewear marks out ring trails and collectables which should be collected to earn points.
Wells looks to the future, exploring the potential of the technology, saying: “Our existing content means that venues can offer a leading virtual reality experience by purchasing the hardware and an annual content subscription. However, another space that we see as a big opportunity is for them to commission custom content.
“This could range from branding the canopies, to creating new characters, to putting features in games, to building their own destination relevant environments. This opens up a whole new category of VR, exploring locations from the sky, effectively what we are now calling location-based flying.”
Prospective flyers and operators can find out more information on the ParadropVR system by visiting the Frontgrid website.
Last year, Frontgrid partnered with Oasys MassMotion to configure the ideal location of its ParadropVR units using proximity modelling.
