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Chaos Karts, an upcoming live-action video game experience coming to London this summer, will let participants live out their Mario Kart dreams in the real world.
The attraction combines real karts with augmented reality and digital projections, allowing players to acquire power-ups and weapons as they race across tracks which are projected onto the floor of a 20,000 square foot space. Up to eight players will be battling to acquire the most points before the end of the race, which can be done by acquiring jewels placed on the track or attacking other players. Weapons will include hammers, bombs, and laser guns.
Each kart is said to sport “anti-collision” technology that cuts the kart’s power prior to collisions, which makes the experience more safe than traditional go-karting despite the fact players are hitting each other with (virtual) hammers and bombs. The experience comes from Little Lion Entertainment, the creators of London’s Crystal Maze experience. Little Lion CEO Tom Lionetti-Maguire says creating a real-life version of a video game has been an obsession for him and that he is delighted his team has “cracked it.”
“The gamification of experiences is a phenomenon that is here to stay, and this is the purest distillation of it…it’s a game and an experience, wrapped up in a whole load of silliness, with a sprinkling of nostalgia for good measure,” Lionetti-Maguire says in an official press release. Tickets for the experience are £30, or about $42, and the attraction opens on August 14.
Chaos Karts sounds similar to the star attraction of Universal Studios Japan’s Super Nintendo World, Mario Kart: Koopa’s Challenge. The official Mario Kart ride sees four people ride in on-rails karts modeled off the game while wearing augmented reality headsets that simulate actions from the video game, such as steering to avoid various hazards and hitting opposing karts with shells. The ride takes players across a variety of locations including Bowser’s Castle and Rainbow Road.
