Immersive Learning
How to Transform Physical Events into an Immersive Online World
Using world-building techniques to initiate and sustain engagement with online events
The mosaic of excited participants stared back from the laptop screen, listening intently to the character before them. As they were given permission to open up their secret survival packages, they collectively learned of their first mission. However, this briefing would have to be quick as danger was near… First, collaborate with their team members, and second, discover the location of their leader who will then reveal more information about their quest. The sound of trouble echo's over the audio, getting louder and louder… before…zip… the character disappears and the call disconnects.
At chronyko, we design immersive events that develop professional skills. Traditionally we would take all our learners away to a unique and theatrical location and treat them to a learning experience unlike any other. However, during the global pandemic, like many businesses we’ve had to innovate and adapt by using collaboration tools and video conferencing services, which are neither very theatrical nor cool. We needed to use a bit of creativity to make these technologies feel more universally fun and immersive for our sessions.
Designing a layered ‘world structure’
World-building is the process of building a physical or virtual environment that encourages participants to engage through a layered narrative. To be successful this has to be more than just a theme. There needs to be a backstory and interconnected personal motivations between key characters within the story. This backstory needs to be deep, consistent and believable, but it needs to be revealed carefully.
Reveal everything too soon and it will overwhelm, reveal too little and the story may no longer make sense, but when done correctly it teases the participant — promising that it has more to give.
To do this, the surface story and overarching character motivations need to be authentic enough to convince the participant to buy into to the world, whilst daring them to ask questions and investigate the world more deeply. At the same time, it must be simple enough that it can be understood without access to the deeper details. Allowing participants to pursue their curiosity through logical investigation of hypotheses is a key technique used to make immersive learning effective.
At our physical in-person events, much of this world-building and storytelling can be facilitated by actors, set dressing, media and props. As soon as our events needed to be adapted to the virtual world, it is suddenly far more difficult to construct this realistic and engaging world.
Creating an engaging virtual world for everyone
To properly immerse the audience, this new world needs to feel different from reality, and it needs to be believable despite every participant logging in from home - with all the distractions that can bring.
Suffice to say, abstracting real life away from real life is going to be hard. So if you can subtly integrate some themes with elements of reality, the audience will find it easier to suspend their disbelief, engage their curiosity and engage fully with the activity.
Whether the world you create is to encourage learning or to entertain, by using a layered approach you have the ability to appeal to a wider spectrum of personality types. The more your audience investigates and interrogates the world, the more they discover, allowing everyone to enjoy the event in their own way. This prevents some participants being disappointed because ‘it was all too complicated to understand’ if they don’t find out all the information you expect them to, whilst also providing the opportunity to thrill those who are prone to getting bored if they can’t actively contribute to a scenario.
Every online event is different but engagement is always the key to success, particularly when it comes to learning.
We have discovered a number of ways of expanding an online event beyond a conference call and a slide deck. At chronyko, we use these techniques to stimulate conversation and curiosity within a safe sandbox-style world where participants can co-operatively share and develop professional skills.
Use physical objects to add realism to your world
There really is no replacement for making something feel real like having a piece of this new world in your hands. Whether that is a manual about how the ‘game world’ functions and its history, providing participants with ‘game-world’ ID badges, developing a world currency system, or themed coffee mugs to theme your computer desk. Providing tactile items to participants will aid the immersion into the world you have built for them.
Whether it is a wax-sealed letter or a full ‘starter pack’, everything from the wrapping used to the font and labelling style can incorporate messaging that contributes to the world you are building. You can use this to great effect to drive excitement before the event even starts.
For example, the shipment might be from a company central to your game world. So setting up a small website for that company might be one small step in turning a plain package, into something that can start to create excitement and build depth to the world.
The important balance to getting these packages right is to make them interesting and special enough to feel valuable but also decoupling their importance from the ability to take part in the event.
From experience, virtual events allow companies to be more globally inclusive than ever, and there are always a few last-minute participants that forget that the last postage date may be measured in weeks and not days depending on which country they call home.
Sending out bespoke kits with unique items will certainly make your attendees feel very special. Just be mindful that occasionally rather than joy, it can cause confusion, discord and competition over who was given the ‘best bits’. The next pitfall is that if certain people have critical items, you can’t organically expect everyone to know when and how each item will be used.
Creating an bespoke and asymmetrical experience for every participant is great, but never forget that every participant’s experience needs to be seamless
Nobody intentionally wants to be the weak link that ruined everyone’s event, but occasionally people have patchy Wi-Fi or life emergencies. So assume there will be distractions (particularly if the event is a day or more long). Relying on the one person with the top-secret password or the settings for the codebreaking tool to be present and available precisely at the time their team will crucially need their help can be tricky and can result in their teammates sat around feeling hopeless and frustrated until help arrives.
This can be mitigated with careful scheduling and participant briefings, but in general, the more unique everything is, the more risk there will be to a smoothly run and fun online event.
Deploy augmented reality
Much more accessible than virtual reality, which would require every participant to have bought some fairly expensive hardware. Augmented reality can cover a broad range of technologies that blend reality with cyberspace. This might be virtual objects or information that will only appear after being scanned with a smartphone camera.
These virtual tokens can be generated from codes, objects or locations and provide the thrill of a treasure hunt or ‘hidden in plain sight’. There are many immersive possibilities for this technology, as it can bring objects or places to life in front of a participant.
Augmented reality is a really effective alternative for unique tactile objects that are revealed at key moments throughout the event. It can also be particularly useful for bringing large, complex or sci-fi creations to life.
Connecting online worlds
Connecting online worlds together really brings the event alive. At a physical venue, participants have the opportunity to explore their environment so the same needs to be true when the ‘venue’ becomes cyberspace.
Online additions to the world can be anything from having websites for the fictional companies you use, a phone line for an in-game character, a Twitter feed, a webcomic, a radio station, bespoke maps for video games or a community forum, just stretch your imagination and adapt to your theme.
These additions allow those comfortable with video conferencing to chat and engage with real-life facilitators, character or actors, and the quietly curious members of the team can explore the social media or in-game world. This creates a role for everyone and facilitates collaborative information sharing.
Break preconceptions
So why bother making all this effort? Clearly getting engagement is the primary key for positive participant outcomes. Whether this is simply to showcase the production value of the event, encourage behavioural change or teach new skills.
Another benefit is that post-event there are normally only a few moments that attendees will really remember. These are the ‘WOW’ moments. Although difficult to predict exactly what causes them, they tend to be the result of situations that surprise, shock, wonder and delight.
By creating the small details, side quests or ‘easter eggs’ to reward those with a curious mind, in reality, you are building the stories that will later be relayed at parties and conferences as anecdotes for years to come — and with them come interesting network connections, new opportunities and of course, industry kudos.
At the simplest level, creating a mind-blowing immersive world online is about creating a world that people want to explore and engage with. You just need to let your creativity loose and don’t be afraid to break expectations and assumed constraints to ensnare the imagination of the participants in a way that is impossible to ignore.
Emma Bentley designs, develops and delivers Immersive Learning solutions for chronyko. To find out more about Immersive Learning, check out the Immersive Learning publication or sign up to the chronyko newsletter.
