HYDERABAD : Not many of us cricket fans have had the privilege of playing the sport in a full-blown stadium packed with spectators holding banners of your name. But long gone are the days when we pine for fantasies like that. Tech has brought us to a point where you can virtually experience places that you only can dream of.
Adding the aspect of gaming to the same, ProYuga, by iB Hubs (a national incubation centre) came up with iB Cricket. iB Cricket is the ticket for enthusiasts to experience playing their favourite game through virtual reality, as if they were playing it at a professional stadium. Set up in arcades where groups or individuals can play India’s favourite sport, iB Cricket is now open for public at Gachibowli and Dilsukhnagar. We checked it out.
After the player is saved into the new game with the desired name, the VR set up placed in a make-shift net of about five feet square, should be worn. The gear consists of a VR headset worn over sweat absorbing paper. The VR headset itself is connected to the ceiling with wires. A cricket bat simulator, which has the handle of a regular cricket bat but actually gathers visual in the headset. What looks like half a cricket bat with wires at its end is the joystick you will be using to play the overs.
Now let’s enter the VR world. Inside, you will find yourself in the green room. Look down and you will find that the wired up simulator in your hand is a professional bat. Turn left and the commands to start or exit the game are visible as buttons flying in the air. To keep you from wandering off in the virtual world and bumping into things in the real world, you will be able to see faint blue lines marking your proximity-limit if you walk too far to the edges of the VRs capacity.
Push your “bat” onto the “button” and instantly you will find yourself in the middle of a stadium on the cricket pitch surrounded by lakhs of spectators, flood lights, banners with your name on it, the whole shebang! With your target visible on the scoreboard right ahead of you, you will get to strike the ball with the virtual bat and also replay and check the impact of the ball.
While that is an incredible experience for any common man, pro cricketers might have an issue with not being able to move freely in the restricted space. Front foot shots aren’t an option with the wired VR headset and the limited space. And as a player won’t be able to feel the impact on the bat and only can estimate a shot based on hand-eye coordination, it might take a few hits to get used to it. With a seating area, and a viewing screen for those not playing, the set up makes for a great recreational session between friends.
With IPL back on, iB Cricket gained popularity through the web show, Super Over League on the Viu App. Stars like Virat Kohli Virender Sehwag and Harbhajan Singh play against their contemporaries on VR – which isn’tthe home-pitch – leading to hilarious results.
The founder of Proyuga, Vasanth is an alumnus of IIIT Hyderabad and Trivikram, CEO of the company, is an alumnus of IIT Delhi. With 14 iB Cricket arcades (and counting) open across India including two in Hyderabad, in Bangalore, Chennai, Vijayawada, Rajahmundry etc, they attempt to create a market for new form of recreation. iB Cricket also opened offices to explore potential business opportunities in over 30 countries, including UK, Singapore, UAE and Australia.
srividya.palaparthi@newindianexpress.com @PSrividya53