08/06/2019
This past weekend, one dad came to play Magic Portal at Riverside Park with his daughter and her best friend.
He was so happy with their experience that he wrote a very kind review on his blog about how to spend some great daddy/daughter time.
I would like to share it with you because this dad really grasped the benefits of Augmented Reality: a mix of electronic device and real world that is able to bond both generations for a WOW moment;
Here it is:
Chances are your kids love screen time. But as a Dad, you know you want them to get up and be active. Why not combine the two with an augmented reality scavenger hunt?
There’s a company called Michigan [AR] Scavenger Hunt and they promise a truly unique and immersive outdoor experience. The scavenger hunt combines the latest augmented reality and geo-location technologies to create an adventure exploring the most interesting areas in West Michigan.
Sounds great, right? So I took my daughter Grace and her bestie Brielle to try it out and here’s what we discovered.
It’s immediately immersive. It took less than a minute for the girls to grasp and accept the storyline. They were looking for goblins to help them on their quest and talking about crystals as if they were really there.
It’s not a video game. While some of the puzzles we had to solve were based on the iPad (provided), many of them had the girls exploring the real world to get the solution and acquire those crystals.
Teamwork makes the dream work. Each of the girls attacked the puzzles in different ways and watching them work together to get to a solution gave me some pretty proud Dad moments watching Grace defer to her friend’s strengths with some and taking the lead with others.
It teaches sharing. There were two girls and only one iPad. But with 15 different stops along our route, there were plenty of chances for each to hold the digital stuff and play navigator.
It’s custom. This isn’t a cookie cutter experience. Many of the puzzles were specific to the area where we played (Riverside Park in Grand Rapids). It felt like the game was made just for us. Plus, the cool gear given to you to help you along the hunt are high quality.
Overall, a really cool way to spend 90 minutes together.