Gbanga was commissioned by the business school HWZ (Hochschule für Wirtschaft Zürich) to create an interactive experience matching their pioneering «Digital Business» courses which are all about jobs in the industry 4.0. So we saw a perfect fit for an experience set in the future which is all about work in the age of starfaring and interplanetary humanity – so a recruitment booth for aspiring cadets was created that want to go on a mission to Mars.

The booth consists of a mobile recruitment unit set up by the fictitious HWZ Space Academy consisting of arcade cabinets with games crafted by Gbanga. In a setup similar to an escape room, the interactive experience consists of four test situations to evaluate if a player is suited for space missions.

The game experience at Man’s World was a complete success and exceeded the set KPIs of our client: The experience was enjoyed for a total of over 5000 minutes by more than 1000 people with joy, enthusiasm and ambition.

The four M.A.R.S. recruitment games of the HWZ Space Academy are about creative thinking, hand-eye coordination and knowledge. The customer journey is based on the  following key moments:

1. Mission Briefing and onboarding: This is a personality test in which cadets have to pick two objects out of an array and explain to the instructor how these objects would help them on Mars.

2. Approaching a planet: In the second test, aspiring cadets take a pole with a rocket ship on it and place it between Earth and Mars. On a screen, a math question is asked: the players need to estimate how far the rocket has travelled within a certain time and place the pole with the rocket accordingly. Their estimate is displayed on screen and shows how close they were to the actual answer.

3. React in challenging situations: In this arcade, players must hold two cables of the same color coming out of the arcade. They do this in order to activate an answer with the same color on the screen for as many multiple choice questions as possible.

4. Safe navigation: In this arcade cabinet with integrated button and joystick, aspiring cadets steer a rocket ship through an asteroid field on their journey to Mars.

Quick facts

  • 3 custom-made arcade cabinets:
  • Distance game with Oculus VR for measurement
  • Quiz with closed loop electric signal
  • Landing game with arcade buttons and joysticks
  • TV screens with news from the future to make the waiting time an experience by itself
  • Booth setup with neon lights, mobile walls and more
  • Printers for sticker printing with individual performance evaluation of the game
  • Custom-made badges to place stickers on

Technologies used

  • Unity 3D
  • HTML5
  • Makey Makey
  • Arcade Button Joystick Kit
  • Oculus SDK
  • Custom Oculus Rift VR controller setup for distance measuring between two points in a room

Pictures: Copyright HWZ