DreamPark, the creator of what it calls “the world’s largest downloadable combined actuality (XR) theme park,” mentioned it has raised $1.1 million in seed funding.
The funding will speed up DreamPark’s mission to make Earth price taking part in once more by reworking odd areas into extraordinary adventures via combined actuality know-how. I bought a demo of the sport in Yerba Buena Park in San Francisco, and it made me smile. It additionally made me assume it was a part of a reasonably good plan to persuade property homeowners to get extra out of their leisure venues.
However we’ll get to that in a bit. Lengthy Journey Ventures led the funding spherical, with participation from Founders Inc.
The corporate is the brainchild of Aidan Wolf, CEO of DreamPark; Kevin Habich, cofounder; and cofounder Brent Bushnell. They got here up with the thought whereas working at Two-Bit Circus, a zany leisure venue in Los Angeles run by Bushnell. Bushnell inspired the thought, incubated it and have become a cofounder.
Positioned on the forefront of combined actuality innovation, DreamPark mentioned it’s capturing a major early benefit within the world XR (prolonged actuality) stay occasion market, valued at $3.6 billion in 2024 and projected to surge to $190.3 billion by 2034 at a 48.7% compound annual development price (CAGR). This explosive development trajectory presents a chance that DreamPark’s know-how and enterprise mannequin are uniquely designed to deal with, the corporate mentioned.
“We’re constructing the world’s largest theme park – one which exists in all places and is accessible to everybody. We wish to make getting out to play worthwhile once more,” mentioned Bushnell. “This funding permits us to increase our footprint of entry factors throughout the nation quickly, develop partnerships with premium IP holders, and proceed enhancing our know-how to ship magical experiences that carry individuals again to real-world areas.”
Bushnell is the eldest son of Atari cofounder Nolan Bushnell. And the youthful Bushnell is aware of the prices of investing in bodily properties, as he runs Two-Bit Circus in downtown Los Angeles. It’s constructed inside a bodily warehouse, and Bushnell’s firm has to pay for that property — even weathering the pandemic. However with DreamPark, he can reinvigorate a bodily venue with out investing something in a brand new property. Against this, a brand new digital actuality leisure venue can price greater than $1 million to open.
Arms-on demo
Wolf and Habich, and Bushnell’s sister Alyssa Bushnell, confirmed me the DreamPark digital theme park in San Francisco within the park close to the Metreon constructing. There was a live performance happening on the time and it was very noisy. However the recreation labored fantastic anyway.
Trying down at my ft, Wolf mentioned the QR code on the mat on the groun was an “entry level.” That’s the place you possibly can scan and enter the digital world. The corporate continues to be constructing a entrance finish for distributing the headsets, however individuals will be capable of carry their mixed-reality headsets from house and play the identical content material.
“We’re setting these up throughout,” Wolf mentioned. “As soon as an space is mapped, it’s there and also you simply present up and play. The massive distinction right here is that DreamParks are locations. They exist in the actual world.”
The mapped space was round 50,000 sq. ft within the park, so it was a reasonably large recreation house. Quickly, the corporate will break into 100,000 sq. ft for the sport with one other replace. That’s about 10 occasions the restricted measurement of Meta’s VR headsets.
“We’re going well beyond the standard limits,” Wolf mentioned. “I believe this essentially adjustments what combined actuality means. Now it’s not this lounge expertise sure to the sofa. It’s an precise world to stroll round and discover and contact. As soon as we get individuals there, we’re gonna actually see that cognitive shift, the place now augmented actuality (AR) is one thing I can exit and expertise, like having fun with a live performance.”
The cofounders gave me a headset to put on. The primary one didn’t work, however a second one functioned fantastic. It was a modified Meta Quest 3 headset that was locked down so it might play simply the DreamPark recreation. It took a short while to load after which I seemed via the headset. Because of the outward-facing cameras, I used to be capable of see the park in combined actuality. That meant I didn’t journey over something as I walked round.
I held the headset to my brow and seemed round. I might see a Mario-like set of bricks floating within the air, and floating digital cash alongside the bodily path. I began strolling round and selecting up the cash and tapping the bricks to gather factors within the recreation. I didn’t go the place there have been individuals mendacity on the grass, however I didn’t handle to navigate to some lava pits in the course of the park. The founders identified that far-off from me, on the Carnaval live performance stage, there was a boss. Usually, if there was no live performance, I might have waltzed over to that location and engaged in a boss battle.
The graphics had been rudimentary, 8-bit type, and but I didn’t thoughts it in any respect because of the novelty of seeing them overlaid on the actual world. Nonetheless, I used to be reluctant to go strolling within the lava pits, as that was a nasty concept within the digital world and I one way or the other felt like it might be a nasty concept to stroll there within the bodily world.
“Our graphics are extra cartoonish, however our Wizard theme has a extra practical look,” Wolf mentioned. “We’re creating 4 theme parks.”
One in every of them is a sci-fi Crash Course, which is an impediment course. And DreamPark is working with a accomplice as effectively. There’s one with a psychedelic theme and one that’s ambient enjoyable.
It’s straightforward to show the expertise right into a multiplayer recreation. You possibly can, as an illustration, race across the park and full a timed expertise in competitors with your pals.
The attraction of a digital overlay on the actual world
DreamPark transforms bodily areas into immersive mixed-reality environments via its community of entry factors: bodily markers, like QR codes, that, when scanned with a Meta Quest 3 headset or cellular machine, unlock digital overlays on real-world areas. The corporate has already established profitable installations at Santa Monica’s Third Road Promenade and The LA County Honest, with deliberate expansions in Seattle, Orange County and several other expos and company occasions.
It’s fairly low-cost to create new areas. All they actually should do is scan an space, overlay a digital recreation stuffed with easy video games, after which drop a mat with a QR code on the property so individuals can scan it and begin taking part in the sport. For property homeowners, this implies they will draw individuals again to their location, getting them to re-engage with the place as a result of individuals wish to play a digital recreation on the bodily place. It’s a option to improve the worth of a bodily property, utilizing digital leisure.
Bushnell pitched the thought for DreamPark on CNBC’s Shark Tank tv present. The sharks didn’t go for it, however the publicity from the present helped floor buyers, Bushnell mentioned. (The Bushnell household goes to seem at Augmented World Expo in Lengthy Seaside, California, in June).
“As a longtime investor, I’ve seen numerous pitches promising to merge the digital and bodily worlds, and DreamPark is the primary that really delivers on the real-world metaverse,” mentioned Cyan Banister, cofounder and normal accomplice at Lengthy Journey Ventures, in a press release. “Aidan is a visionary builder of immersive methods, and Brent is a pioneer in playful public areas, making them the proper workforce to make rising tech really feel human, accessible, and unforgettable. They’ve cracked the code on location-based AR, delivering a 10x expertise that’s as magical because it’s scalable. This isn’t simply immersive leisure; it’s an entire new class.”
The funding comes when retail landlords and occasion venues search progressive options to drive foot site visitors and improve engagement. Whereas typical VR venues price over $1 million to construct, DreamPark delivers a completely immersive, multiplayer expertise that pays for itself in its first month of income.
“Our capital expense is like one in all a hundredth of our rivals, which is superb. After which this lets us transfer astronomically sooner than everybody else. I sort of imagine in a Nintendo philosophy, which is, they take antiquated know-how, however they use it in a brand new means that makes it precious. We’re utilizing entry factors,” Wolf mentioned.
There’s no building or everlasting infrastructure required. It’s a radically extra inexpensive option to flip underused areas into high-impact locations.
“We’re not simply creating participating content material, we’re constructing a platform that revitalizes communities by giving individuals a cause to assemble, play, and join in bodily areas in actual life,” mentioned Wolf. “DreamPark bridges the digital and bodily worlds, creating a brand new class of play the place the magic of digital worlds enhances real-life connections. We’re reimagining what’s potential when the areas round us develop into canvases for shared journey and creativeness.”
The seed funding will help DreamPark’s aggressive enlargement plans, together with deploying entry factors throughout new areas, launching partnerships with main IP holders to create branded theme park experiences, and increasing the corporate’s fleet of rental Meta Quest 3 headsets items nationwide.
DreamPark is rising the event workforce to speed up content material creation and platform capabilities. DreamPark’s management workforce brings deep expertise from firms together with Two-Bit Circus, Smiley Cap, and SNAP, Inc., positioning them to execute their bold imaginative and prescient of making the infrastructure for worldwide mixed-reality leisure.
The place it’s going
Bushnell mentioned the workforce has been working for round two years. However the founders have been concerned with AR for greater than a decade. They confirmed up at Two-Bit Circus and began making mixed-reality video games, which keep in mind bodily actuality as a recreation house. There are about 10 contractors within the firm engaged on content material.
They discovered that gamers are completely satisfied to put on the headsets for half-hour at a time, significantly when they’re taking part in with mates.
“We see ourselves extra as a tech firm than like a location-based leisure firm. We hope to remain small as a core workforce whereas nonetheless reaching tens of millions or billions of individuals,” Wolf mentioned.
The video games are in a non-public alpha testing section now.
“I might say that the headset we at present have in our fingers is the precise headset we have to carry this to the plenty. So the good half concerning the firm we’re constructing is we aren’t ready for some like watershed second,” Wolf mentioned. “We’re not ready for something now. We’re simply getting it into plenty of locations the place individuals already congregate.”
DreamPark is popping out with an app that can let customers scan their native park after which begin utilizing that house as a degree, Wolf mentioned. However DreamPark itself will create partnerships with a number of the finest locations itself and get permission to do the sport on the properties.
At Two-Bit Circus, as an illustration, DreamPark might lengthen the leisure into the outside car parking zone, giving extra sq. footage for leisure.
Bushnell had an incredible second when he was taking part in an AR recreation with drift racing on a racetrack within the Two-Bit Circus car parking zone. He famous that combined actuality doesn’t have the Achilles Heel of VR, which is that it makes half the individuals nauseous.
“That was actually the second that broke my mind for combined actuality,” he mentioned. “We had been on precise drift bikes, pedaling round amassing cash. And I went twice round that factor, chasing after someone else on a drift bike. And, you understand, my coronary heart price was at 150. And I used to be simply completely going bananas. And I took the headset off, and all that world that had motivated me to pedal my ass off was gone. It simply actually felt like this isn’t simply going to alter leisure. That is going to alter remedy and health and studying.”
Bushnell mentioned so many other forms of leisure are based mostly on deploying big quantities of capital. However this type of theme park could possibly be up and working in a matter of minutes. Bushnell believes individuals will likely be completely satisfied to purchase tickets to get an opportunity to play. He mentioned his four-year-old child loves it, as does his 82-year-old father.
To me, it felt a bit like the start of the world of Cyberpunk 2077, whereas Bushnell mentioned it reminded him of the Korean drama, The Reminiscences of Alhambra, the place individuals put on contact lens shows and have an journey overlaid on actual streets.
“These are stunning locations naturally. Let’s increase them with a little bit extra cool storytelling, and also you’re off and working,” Bushnell mentioned. “The world is lonely and remoted, we consider this a path to being social once more, getting individuals out in public. And we wish to invite landlords of all stripes to host DreamParks.”
