We used Apple's ARKit & Unity to develop the game. The game is installed on an iPad which has a LiDAR sensor. The LiDAR sensor is used to detect the physical built area in the mall. The game is projected onto the physical build area in the mall.

The game is also projected onto a 3D Trick Eye element in the form of a large-area floor sticker so that shoppers don’t have to be in the experience to see the experience. So elements in the ‘garden’ like the log, sitting stones, and trees are actually part of the 3D Trick Eye.

3D trick eye gameplay boundary from the upper level of the mall

Gameplay

The objective of the game was to help Huat Huat collect oranges in time for Chinese New Year. The game would start with a countdown, and the oranges are scattered throughout the virtual garden. Players need to walk around the garden to find all the oranges. They then have to toss a bone to collect the oranges. There are also some treasure chests hidden in the garden, which contain bonus points.

There are normal & golden oranges. Normal oranges are worth 5 points, and golden oranges are worth 15 points. The game would end after 120 seconds, and the player with the highest score would win a prize.

Gameplay video

Challenges

This required a lot of testing & fine tuning so that the game would map perfectly onto the physical build area in the mall. This time we also had multiple devices running the game at the same time with a leaderboard. So we had to ensure that the game was running smoothly on all devices and that the leaderboard was working properly.

Apple's ARKit was still in the early stages at the time, so we had to do a lot of testing to ensure that the game was running smoothly.

Results

The game was a huge success, with a lot of people playing the game during the Chinese New Year season. There were long queues to play the game every day during the Chinese New Year season. The client was thrilled with the results and the positive feedback from shoppers.

Long queue to play the game