Sandbox VR, the destination for premium location-based virtual reality experiences, today announced that Stranger Things: Catalyst, has debuted at Sandbox VR locations worldwide.
The fully immersive VR experience was created by Sandbox VR’s development team in collaboration with Netflix.
Actor Matthew Modine reprises his role as Dr. “Papa” Brenner in this experience which allows fans to step inside an immersive chapter of the global phenomenon.
Stranger Things is one of the most popular Netflix series ever, with multiple award nominations and over 140 million people tuning in for the latest season. The cultural phenomenon has been nominated for 230 awards and won over 70 worldwide. Now, just ahead of the highly anticipated fifth and final season, fans can step inside the beloved series like never before, in full-body VR.
In Stranger Things: Catalyst, players become Dr. Brenner’s test subjects and explore the sinister halls of Hawkins National Laboratory, the eerie glow of the Rainbow Room, the shadow-haunted woods of Mirkwood, and the nightmarish Upside Down. Every location comes alive with stunning visuals and mind-blowing action sequences. Players can fight like Eleven using incredible telekinetic powers to hurl objects, crush obstacles, and fight back against supernatural threats like Demobats, Demodogs, and even the terrifying Demogorgon.
Turn Your World Upside Down
Trapped in Hawkins National Lab, players and their friends must escape, rescue survivors, and overcome an onslaught of supernatural creatures. Can you trust Dr. Brenner? Or are you just one of his lab rats? Players will discover the mysteries of the lab and learn the true limits of their powers. The rift to the Upside Down is open. The enemy is coming, and the fate of Hawkins is in your hands.
“The launch of Stranger Things: Catalyst represents the culmination of our most ambitious collaboration with Netflix yet,” said Steve Zhao, CEO of Sandbox VR, in a statement. “By creating an entirely new chapter in the Stranger Things universe, we’ve crafted an experience that goes beyond anything fans have seen before. Our technology allows players to truly embody the supernatural powers they’ve watched on screen, creating unforgettable moments as they face the thrills of the Upside Down alongside their friends.”
Sandbox VR is creating the future of entertainment by building the world’s most immersive experiences using bleeding-edge virtual reality technology. Their patented motion-tracking technology, which captures the movements of a player’s entire body, combines with a high-quality haptic system to provide players with unprecedented realism and complete immersion that’s not possible with home VR or other location-based VR platforms. Players’ own bodies act as their game controllers; all they have to do is step into the virtual world and participate in the action unfolding all around them.
Hands-on experience
I played Stranger Things: Catalyst at the Sandbox VR location in San Francisco with Alice Martinez and Ashley Trick. I had recruited a team of five to attend the demo, but a couple of players couldn’t make it. That was fine with Sandbox VR, as we did fine with three.
We arrived at the place and it was busy and we had some appointment confusion. But we solved that and went downstairs. The employees had us suit ourselves up with four sensors — two on our wrists and two on our ankles. We put on heavy vests that had the hardware in it, as well as sensors that pushed in on our chests on occasion. Then we put on our VR headsets, which had been cleaned and were comfy for me even though I was wearning glasses. That’s what they mean by having a full-body experience.
We got a brief tutorial that told us not to run into each other and were told to raise our hands and shout when we needed help from the staff. We started up but Alice’s headset wasn’t working so we had to raise our hands right away. She got a replacement that worked and then we fired up the experience.
At the outset, there were three of us dressed in patient jump suits. We were patients in the, Hawkins National Lab, the secret facility where the star of the show, Eleven, escaped from in the first season of Stranger Things, the Netflix show. The head of that facility, Papa Brenner, was there. We did a tutorial on how to use our special powers, which included force push. Another power was grabbing items like batteries or blocks and then lobbing them at enemies. Each use of the powers required us to physically act out like we were throwing something with out arms. Once we got the hang of it, the experience started.
Speaking to us from behind glass, Brenner started out briefing us on what was happening and he urged us to find out what was going on at the lab, where we were about to encounter the creatures of the nightmarish Upside Down. Brenner had an emergency that called him out of the room. Then one of those creatures appeared and killed the assistants.
Next, the creatures started coming after us. We had to start grabbing things with our powers of telekinesis and then throwing them at the monsters. We had to hurl objects at a rapid pace and then crush obstacles in our way as we tried to escape.
There was one point in the experience where the floor fell out from under us and we all started falling. It took me a split second to recover my wits, but Ashely let out one of her big screams and even Alice later said that the fake VR fall through her for a loop.
Supernatural threats like Demobats, Demodogs and even the terrifying Demogorgon came at us. We were on platforms that felt like we were moving, but we were standing in a room inside Sandbox VR. The monsters got bigger and bigger and we had to start throwing bigger and bigger objects at them. We could shock them with electricity or throw things that blew up on the monsters. It seemed like all of the Upside Down had been emptied to stop us from succeeding. Lots of jump scares had us all screaming.
We finally made it out and the experience came to an end after about 30 minutes. We were drenched in sweat, and we got to see a replay of the experience. Ashley had some pretty good shrieks, and Alice was a great buffer protecting me from monsters. I came out with the high score in terms of monster kills, but I’ve done a number of Sandbox VR experiences. Alice did a lot of home VR, but she never had been to a venue. And Ashley was a complete noob at the experience. Fortunately, no one came out sick. It was a lot of fun, and it felt true to the Stranger Things IP and the action was pretty thrilling.
A big journey for Sandbox VR
This marks Sandbox VR’s third collaboration with Netflix, following the tremendous success of Squid Game Virtuals and Rebel Moon: The Descent. Squid Game Virtuals has achieved remarkable success since its launch, generating record-breaking sales and attracting millions of players worldwide.
Stranger Things Season 5 will debut in three volumes on Netflix this fall: with four episodes on November 26, three episodes on Christmas Day, and The Finale on New Year’s Eve. That’s likely to have a good effect on Sandbox VR’s revenues.
All Sandbox VR experiences are developed by an in-house gaming studio led by game industry veterans and are specifically designed for groups to play as social experiences. Teams of up to six friends freely roam and explore virtual worlds together while relying on each other to succeed.
Stranger Things: Catalyst is now available at Sandbox VR’s locations worldwide. Booking open at sandboxvr.com/experience/strangerthings. Sandbox VR’s locations draw over 117,000 players monthly. At about $50 per 30 minute session, that’s gross sales of more than $5.85 million a month.
This is pretty good, considering the company almost went out of business during the pandemic in 2020. During COVID-19, Zhao had to shut all of the Sandbox VR locations due to shelter-in-place policies. The company filed for bankruptcy protection in August 2020 and then reorganized and emerged in November 2020. As the pandemic subsided, Sandbox VR was able to start opening locations again. By the end of 2021, the company had about 15 locations open. Now it has 60 locations.