Category: Wargaming

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Wargaming and VRTech Forge Partnership Providing Location-based VR Gaming

World of Tanks developer Wargaming.net has announced a collaboration with Moscow-based virtual reality (VR) company VRTech to bring location-based immersive experiences to the European market.

VRTech is known for location-based VR solutions, including CinemaVR and PolygonVR. The collaboration is set to combine VRTech’s solutions and Wargaming’s expertise in game design and visual effects.

VRTech - CinemaVR

 “The potential of taking location-based VR to a new level is an opportunity we had to capitalize on,” said Aleksandr Zezulin, R&D Operations Director at Wargaming in a statement. “With this partnership, we are planning to change the public perception of VR from a one-time experience to a source of fun, re-playable entertainment. This type of new business for Wargaming is a scalable, successful set-up that will help us produce high-quality entertainment.”

“We’re excited to announce our strategic partnership with Wargaming,” said Yuri Krylov, CEO of VRTech. “This unique collaboration has all the chances of changing the VR market, and we welcome location and IP owners in EU to join our partnership on this exciting journey.”

VRTech launched in December 2016, bringing its VR booths to over 20 locations in cinemas and malls in Russia’s largest cities.  Its first European showcase of CinemaVR and PolygonVR technology will happen during Gamescom 2017 this month.

Wargaming.net has supported VR and augmented reality (AR) in various forms over the last couple of years. Promotions have included a partnership with the Tank Museum at Bovington, as well as creating content for other museums around the world, such as the National Museum of the Royal Navy, the RAF Museum, and the Pacific Battleship Centre.

VRFocus will continue its coverage of Wargaming.net, reporting back with further VR updates.

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World of Tanks Rolls Into Reality With Google Tango and Hololens

We began today on VRFocus with a Life In 360° focused on historical miltiary aircraft now we get our head out of the clouds and back down to earth for some ground-based machines of war.

We’ve reported several times on the efforts of World of Tanks developer Wargaming who have previously experimented with 360 degree video, augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) in tandem with various videogames in its World of… series. This has usually been courtesy of Wargaming’s ‘Special Projects Division’ which has taken on a number of partnerships with institutions such as museums, as Wargaming seek to not only be a gaming platform but use that to help educate on the realities behind their title.

World of Tanks screenshot 05One of the museum partners is the Tank Museum at Bovington, found in the in the South West England county of Dorset. As part of the recent Tankfest 2017 event the Special Projects Division revealed a brand new experience featuring World of Tanks’ ultra-rare model the German-made Sturmtiger or ‘Assault Tiger’, part of the series of assault vehicles built on the design platform of the devastating Tiger I tank. Wargaming’s team, in collaboration with Gravity Jack, this time utilised support for both Microsoft’s Hololens head-mounted display (HMD) and Google’s Tango platform. Having the Sturmtiger roll straight into the museum before showcasing its movement, firing and gives both an ‘exploded’ and cross section view of what makes up the tank.

You can see a video of what visitors to Tankfest could enjoy below. VRFocus will bring you more updates on the latest uses of MR and the the Hololens and Tango platforms as we get it.

 

 

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Wargaming’s Special Projects Division Attending VR Connects London

Tomorrow sees the return of the annual PG Connects London event with the inaugural VR Connects London taking place alongside. VR Connects London is an industry focused conference which’ll feature virtual reality (VR) professionals and companies from across the world. Most recently World of Tanks developer Wargaming.net announced it’ll be in attendance, with its director of special projects Tracy Spaight set to discuss content marketing.

Wargaming.net maybe best known for its popular online vehicle combat title World of Tanks, but over the past year or so the studio has been actively keeping the history of the vehicles and events they took part in alive through VR and augmented reality (AR) experiences. These have included content for museums around the world, such as the National Museum of the Royal Navy, the RAF Museum, the Tank Museum at Bovington, and the Pacific Battleship Centre.

“The Wargaming team is passionate about history,” said Spaight. “We are committed to ‘getting it right’ in the exacting recreation of each of the tanks, planes, and ships represented in our games. Our players appreciate our attention to historical detail and support our museum partnerships over the past few years.”

Tank 100

For VR Connects London, Spaight’s talk in the business track segment, titled Content Marketing Through VR & AR, looks at these partnerships with the official description stating: “Through these collaborations we have helped to solve some of the outstanding challenges faced by museums today – to wit, how to reach ‘digital natives’, who grew up in a different media environment than baby boomers, and how to make inaccessible areas of the museum (such as the engine room of a destroyer) accessible. This talk explores why we work with museums, the challenges of doing so, and the benefits (to both parties) of these exercises in content marketing and corporate social responsibility.”

VRFocus will be following what’s going on at VR Connects London, so stay with us for more details.