VR Director: Steve Hallema
Produces: Corine Meijers
Lead designer Koen Koopman
Become an Imaginary Friend!
A grieving child struggles to separate reality from fantasy. He creates YOU–his (imaginary) friend–to fight the monsters in his mind. Although you have fun together, he starts to grow disconnected from his surroundings... Are you helping, or just making things worse?
Synopsis: The Imaginary Friend invites you to take part in the vivid imagination of Daniel, a grieving eight-year-old struggling with the line between reality and fantasy.
Become Daniel’s imaginary friend and let him share his world with you. Discover his joys and anxieties, even help him fight his demons head-on. However, as you spend time together, Daniel’s surroundings don’t quite understand. Why is he talking to himself? Is he crazy? When his father intends to fix him, Daniel needs to figure out his feelings before disconnecting from reality completely...
About VR and its unique storytelling possibilities/ Explanation of Technical Advancements:
One of the great possibilities of VR is its power to directly include a player in its story- telling and allow them to be (almost) entirely present in the story world. The Imaginary Friend boldly seeks to push player involvement, setting out to create a personal experience where the player can actively engage with its lead character. With this unique challenge in interactive storytelling, the project utilises an exciting development in the field of VR: Volumtetric video.
Volumetric video is a new technology that captures live performers in 3D, allowing our team to move real actors freely in the virtual space of the project. All the while, ensuring that the expressions and emotions of the performances are preserved. The team also pushes this technology further by making it interactive. Something no other Volumetric video project has done on this scale and with similar dramatic impact. Pioneering a technique called ‘head retargeting’, the team was able to subtly turn the actors head in the direction of the player. This contributes to the player feeling like they’re acknowledged by the lead character, greatly enhancing the connection you make during the experience.