Zombies breach the barrier of our fort. It’s taking forever for my machine gun to reload. Dammit! C’mon already! I look toward Spenser, who’s being eaten alive by merciless creatures with glowing, sunken eyes and discolored flesh, eager to gnaw on our limbs.
Finally, I’m locked and loaded. I unleash a series of shots. Spenser is safe, for now, and we have time to rebuild the fort before the next wave of living dead attacks.
Move over laser tag, things just got much cooler.
Touching down in Woburn is the first virtual reality arena of its kind in the United States. MindTrek VR is set to officially open in August.
Item photographer Spenser Hasak and I are here to test the “Zombie Survival” game. For two 15-minute sessions, we are inserted into a virtual apocalyptic setting where we fight for survival against zombie hordes.
Our responsibility, with up to eight teammates, is to combat these barren lifeforms, making this entertainment phenomenon perfect for birthday parties and corporate outings.
“We all see each other in the game and now we go play it as a team,” said David O’Connor, a MindTrek VR owner. “The game is going to be different every time. You might do a great job and he might turn and run. You might do a great job and she might do even better.”
O’Connor said that unlike watching a movie where the ending is always the same, players control their fate.
Spenser and I are first brought into a room for a tutorial on how to use the equipment, which weighs about 20 pounds. We then strap on a backpack created by Alienware, OSVR goggles with an over-the-ear headset, and a rifle that reloads manually or automatically and can be used as a machine gun, assault rifle, sniper rifle or shotgun with a click of the button.
We are escorted into what O’Connor said is the largest untethered arena in the country. Two games can be played simultaneously. There are no walls in this 4,000-square-foot space, since they are created only virtually and appear to players when they are immersed in the game.
Game masters broadcast tips to our headsets, reminding us of such features as how to change from assault rifle to sniper, and how to use the elevator located in the corner of the virtual arena to move to an upper level.
While we were going up in the elevator to the (virtual) second floor, I asked Spenser, “Do you feel that?”
“Dude, it feels like we’re actually in an elevator. This is crazy,” he said.
Thousands of high-tech cameras allow the system to communicate between players and bring the interactive game to life. For example, you can see when one player is shooting and if they are a righty or lefty or if they are pointing their gun at the ceiling or the floor. You can see if he or she is running or hopping on the elevator to snipe from a higher vantage point.
Most importantly, you can see when your partner is being overrun with zombies, so you can swoop in and save the day. Zombies respawn in 10 seconds, to pick up where they left off.
At the end of the game, a scoreboard shows the results of players down to specifics, such as the number of headshots, zombie kills and deaths, in addition to the overall team score and how you rank nationally.
For those not interested in slaying zombies, there is a game called “singularity,” where players can fight against killer robots and drones, and a game titled “engineerium,” where players can ascend through a mind-bending, mystical world where reality is turned upside down.
The virtual experience hits at a price of $49 per person.
“The commercialized versions generally are better than consumer grade versions,” O’Connor said. “A trampoline park is cooler than the trampoline you’ve had as a kid. CoCo Key is cooler than your pool.”
MindTrek VR has taken a once-isolated virtual reality experience and made it interactive, which O’Connor said hasn’t been done before in America.
Reservations can be made at mindtrekvr.com.
Matt Demirs can be reached at [email protected]
