Fivestone Studios, the award-winning immersive multimedia company, is reaching for the stars with the company’s significant contribution to Cosmic Crisis, the latest cutting-edge interactive experience from The Escape Game (TEG).
Recently launched at TEG’s immensely popular Opry Mills location in Nashville, Cosmic Crisis is set to open soon at several of the company’s 37 retail locations across the United States. In this thrilling and immersive interactive game, groups of up to eight players embark on a deep-space adventure that demands quick thinking and close cooperation to save the solar system.
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Guiding the players through their journey is Hermes, an AI sidekick providing mission-critical analysis and guidance as they face a series of calamities.
Ben Enos, TEG’s Senior Director of Product Design, expressed his enthusiasm for this groundbreaking escape game: “Cosmic Crisis is our most exhilarating escape game yet, and we’re thrilled to unveil it to the world. We’ve taken innovation to new heights with this captivating adventure, immersing players in stunning environments, delivering heart-pounding cinematic moments, and offering a fully interactive asteroid-blasting mini-game. Fivestone made for an awesome partner on this ambitious project! We can’t wait for our guests to blast off on this stellar new adventure!” Watch the teaser below:
From the project’s inception, Enos and TEG’s Game Designer Troy Armstrong envisioned an epic adventure with numerous escape-game firsts. Their ambitious goals included real-time interactive graphics, state-of-the-art projection on the spacecraft’s screens, the development and seamless integration of an onboard AI character, and unprecedented levels of interaction between the vessel’s physical controls and the digital elements of the game. take a look at the Behind-the-Scenes video:
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The process began with user-experience workflow, with Fivestone creating design boards and flowcharts to map out the story and user journey. Once these were approved, the creation of game assets moved into high gear.
According to Woodall, “Our team immediately began developing an interactive application using Epic Games’ Unreal Engine. Our custom CG visuals form what players see through the spaceship’s screens. As they navigate through space, dock at a space station, battle incoming asteroids and a black hole, and interact with Hermes, our app not only delivers cinematic storytelling content but also tracks and reports progress in real-time.”
As the work of animators and developers came together, in-depth testing took place to ensure that the application seamlessly connected with the game’s real-world elements, including buttons, controllers, physical aspects of the ship, and puzzle pieces.
Harkness emphasized, “After many years of working together, we have a solid understanding of how Ben, Troy, and their colleagues think, and what it takes to meet and exceed their expectations. Overall, we’re very proud to see how seamlessly this attraction works to deliver thrilling experiences. All high-tech aspects of Cosmic Crisis raise the bar to exciting new levels for players.”
He added, “Where do we go from here? The sky’s the limit!”
Fivestone is known for tackling storytelling challenges using emerging technologies and patented processes, collaborated with TEG’s creators on this project. The multidisciplinary project team included Executive Creative Director Traylor Woodall, Technical Director Kevin Harkness, Director of Innovation Justin Eslinger, Design Director Daniel Petrino, Producer Jennifer Bonior, Unreal Developers Jeff Crouse, Carson Carr, and Victor Petrov, Front-End Developer Cody Parnell, and Video Editors Ken Conrad and Christian Whittemore.
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