Our main goal was to develop a VR mini-game, dedicated to winter sports: skiing and sledding. We also set up 2 autonomous VR zones for the game in the store.
Decathlon is the largest sporting goods retailer, that operates in 49 countries. It has recently launched its second store in Kyiv and we created a VR solution for it.
We realized this project on Unreal Engine 4 for the Valve Index VR headset and set up 2 autonomous VR zones in the shop. We reproduced real landscapes and runs of Mont Blanc using topographical maps.
CHALLENGES
In the making of the project, we tried to make a functionality intuitive and user-friendly even for inexperienced users. Apart from that, we paid attention to a few moments that would guarantee the comfortable usage of the application.
For many inexperienced users, VR causes motion-induced sickness or dizziness. It was important for us to minimize these effects.
SOLUTION
In skiing, we implemented control according to a principle “where you look – there you go”. We are tracing the tilt and rotation of the head. Tilt to the right/left allows a customer to shift to the sides, without changing the direction of movement, and turning your head allows the user to rotate. Almost all users when turning instinctively leaned to the sides, that’s why there was no discrepancy between the expectation of movement and the result visible with the eyes.
Our client wanted only the users of the loyalty program to have access to VR and store employees to change some parameters in VR zones. That’s why we created a separate configuration file. In this file, employees can turn the apps on/off for each zone, enter a session limit in seconds, set the interval between sessions, and regulate movement speeds in each game. It is also possible to enter the minimum allowable interval between sessions for users to avoid the queue.
Visitors have to scan his card with a scanner, placed in each VR zone to access the app.
All visits are recorded in the database, so the client can track the popularity of the VR zone and the number of visitors on different days.
RESULT
Using Unreal Engine 4 we have created a VR mini-game, dedicated to winter sports: skiing and sledding. Every day, the VR zone attracts more than 100 visitors who get unforgettable emotions while skiing or sledding down Mont Blanc right in the Decathlon store.
