{"id":62573,"date":"2019-03-29T03:10:29","date_gmt":"2019-03-29T10:10:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.taterboy.com\/blog\/2019\/03\/paul-allens-immersive-holodome-gets-interactive-with-new-zombie-hunting-game-that-founder-tested\/"},"modified":"2019-03-29T03:10:29","modified_gmt":"2019-03-29T10:10:29","slug":"paul-allens-immersive-holodome-gets-interactive-with-new-zombie-hunting-game-that-founder-tested","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.taterboy.com\/blog\/2019\/03\/paul-allens-immersive-holodome-gets-interactive-with-new-zombie-hunting-game-that-founder-tested\/","title":{"rendered":"Paul Allen\u2019s immersive Holodome gets interactive with new zombie-hunting game that founder tested"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The new immersive reality game \u201cDome of the Dead\u201d was developed for Vulcan and Holodome by Seattle-based VR studio Endeavor One. (Vulcan Image)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In the months since Vulcan, Inc., placed its Holodome<\/a> inside Seattle\u2019s Museum of Pop Culture, 38,000 people have stepped into the 360-degree immersive reality experience. Now, almost a year later, Paul Allen\u2019s company is unveiling an interactive twist that the late Microsoft co-founder got a glimpse of shortly before he passed away.<\/p>\n

\u201cDome of the Dead: Escape the Bayou\u201d takes Holodome beyond the passive nature of its previous content offerings and allows users to take up arms against advancing zombies. The first-person-shooter game \u2014 which will be available to the public starting Friday at MoPOP \u2014 lets up to four players experience the high-tech surround video and sound inside Vulcan\u2019s creation, without the use of a headset.<\/p>\n

The objective was to create something that appealed to a wide range of gamers, and for it to not have a big learning curve. And that made sense when it came to Allen himself, who was described as a \u201ccurious gamer\u201d who was very much interested in virtual reality and interactive experiences.<\/p>\n

At Vulcan\u2019s studio in Seattle\u2019s Georgetown neighborhood, Allen got to see and try a very early version of the game last September, just a few weeks before he died on Oct. 15<\/a>, at age 65.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was fantastically curious about this,\u201d said Kamal Srinivasan, director of product development at Vulcan and Holodome\u2019s product manager. \u201cBefore this game got rolling he definitely wanted to understand, \u2018OK, what are the different kinds of games?\u2019 He loved it. That\u2019s why we\u2019re very excited that we got it completed.\u201d<\/p>\n

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The latest iteration of Vulcan\u2019s Holodome will snap together like LEGOs and feature a redesigned entryway. (Vulcan Image)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cDome of the Dead\u201d was created in a tight 6-month timeline by Endeavor One<\/a>, a Seattle-based VR company founded in 2014 by veteran game developers. Here\u2019s the official description of what to expect:<\/p>\n

\n

What was supposed to be a safe use of alien technology to purify the earth\u2019s waters somehow turned into humanity\u2019s ultimate fight for survival \u2014 and now you are in the middle of it. In \u201cDome of the Dead,\u201d an intense 4-person cooperative shooter game, you and your friends must work together to escape the onslaught of alien-zombie hybrids prowling the infested Bayou and reach one of the last safe zones in existence.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The 10-minute game is pretty much what you would expect from reading that \u2014 lots of bullets flying and zombies exploding. Srinivasan\u00a0said in the month or so that they\u2019ve been testing it at the museum at Seattle Center, they\u2019re measuring success in \u201cscreams per minute.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you think think about VR multiplayer games, you\u2019ve got to move,\u201d Srinivasan said. \u201cIn this, we\u2019re moving the scenes around you.\u201d<\/p>\n

Previous content inside Holodome wasn\u2019t quite this heart pounding. The passive experiences were more cinematic, and were meant to wow visitors with sound and video absorption, as well as vibrations underfoot which played to the sense of touch.<\/p>\n

But while user scores were high overall and feedback was positive for experiences such as \u201cDeath Planet Rescue,\u201d \u201cJustin Timberlake\u2019s Montana,\u201d and \u201cSeattle Seahawks: Art of the Play,\u201d MoPOP\u2019s Holodome visitors voiced a desire for more interaction, and Vulcan listened.<\/p>\n

Developers set out to build something that wouldn\u2019t require users to wear a bunch of tracking gear. \u201cDome of the Dead\u201d fits that bill, because players are tracked inside Holodome just by the plastic guns they carry, each with a color-coordinated laser pointer for taking out zombies and keeping up with each shooter\u2019s score.<\/p>\n

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The weapon used in \u201cDome of the Dead\u201d is the only device needed to track a player inside Holodome. (GeekWire Photo \/ Kurt Schlosser)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cOur foundation has been in VR, so the idea of \u2018VR without a head-mounted display\u2019 was an immediate appeal for us as game creators,\u201d said Tom Doyle, co-founder of Endeavor One. \u201cOur history as first-person-shooter console developers meant we got to apply our years of know-how, and translate that type of entertainment to the emerging Holodome platform. That being said, like all things new, it was exciting and with lots of valuable lessons from the development process. Being first means there are no rules.\u201d<\/p>\n

Endeavor One has created original VR entertainment titles for console, PC and mobile and most recently helped Microsoft Studios and 343 Industries launch Windows Mixed Reality with the release of \u201cHalo Recruit.\u201d<\/p>\n

In three stages during \u201cDome of the Dead,\u201d the action gets progressively more intense, but gamers are battling for the top score more than trying to stay alive in the swamp setting. Despite swipes from creatures that appear to leave bloody marks across the combatants, you can\u2019t be killed, you don\u2019t lose any power and you never run out of ammo. I found myself holding the trigger down for the duration, spraying everything that moved.<\/p>\n

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Player scores are show on a scoreboard inside Holodome after a round of \u201cDome of the Dead.\u201d (GeekWire Photo \/ Kurt Schlosser)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Doyle cited two major components in what makes the game appealing to casual and hardcore gamers.<\/p>\n

\u201cFirst is the shared social aspect,\u201d he said. \u201cSocial co-presence in VR is only merely representative in its current form. In the Holodome, being able to stand side by side with other players makes it a much more human gaming experience.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe second component is the concept of \u2018immersive reality\u2019 \u2014 the full high definition sensory experience is something that really needs to be seen to be completely understood,\u201d Doyle added. \u201cThere is nothing on the market quite like it. With \u2018Dome of the Dead\u2019 we wanted something both action-packed and suspenseful to introduce the public to Holodome and showcase it as a gaming platform.\u201d<\/p>\n

Along with content offerings, Holodome itself is also evolving physically. The latest iteration of the dome being built in Georgetown is 20 percent bigger than what\u2019s used at MoPOP and it can snap together like LEGOs in three days and come apart in one day. The door to enter has been reimagined and so has the vibrating floor.<\/p>\n

When asked whether Vulcan will continue to develop Holodome in the absence of Allen, Srinivasan said it was the billionaire\u2019s vision to bring the concept to life.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s business as usual on the Vulcan side of things,\u201d Srinivasan said. \u201cThere are no changes on the Holodome directive. We\u2019re going hard at our potential customer segment. \u2026 Our vision was, \u2018Can we create a shared immersive reality without isolating and without a headset?\u2019 That\u2019s what we\u2019ve been out to prove and we are well on that journey to make sure we can do that.\u201d<\/p>\n

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The new immersive reality game \u201cDome of the Dead\u201d was developed for Vulcan and Holodome by Seattle-based VR studio Endeavor One. (Vulcan Image) In the months since Vulcan, Inc., placed its Holodome inside Seattle\u2019s Museum of Pop Culture, 38,000 people have stepped into the 360-degree immersive reality experience. Now, almost a year later, Paul Allen\u2019s… Read the full article…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":62574,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[174,377],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-62573","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-games-media","category-gaming"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t