Friday is here at last, which means it’s time to trade your corporate to-dos for weekend fun. So, what would help you relax and recharge tonight—taking in the latest movie, dining out at a local restaurant or exploring the heart of Paris during the Impressionist era and mingling with famous artists?
While Paris is always a good idea, jetting there after work for just one night, not to mention the time-travel element, seems unlikely—until now. Thanks to Fabien Barati.
As co-founder of Excurio, an entertainment company, formerly known as Emissive, Barati engineers international cultural adventures through virtual reality. While the technology has existed for decades (hello, Nintendo, in the 1980s), Excurio offers a new pathway to entertainment through a format Barati calls “Immersive Expeditions.”
“Expeditions, because you wear a virtual reality headset, but you are free to move in a very big space,” Barati says. “And in the headset, you will see the pyramid of Khufu or the Notre-Dame cathedral… and you really feel that you are there.”
The virtual reality appeal
How many times have you sat down to watch TV, been distracted by texting or doomscrolling and had to rewind the show? And while Nicole Kidman tells us, “Heartbreak feels good in a place like this,” sit next to one mouth-breather at the movies and, boom—that annoyance disrupts your previously rapt attention on the big screen.
Not the case with an Immersive Expedition. Instead of watching something take place and chancing a potential distraction, you’re fully engaged—rubbing elbows with the painters, walking around the pyramid. You’re living out the experience.
“Your senses are hacked,” Barati says. “It’s not real, but your brain and senses tell you it’s real.”
Excurio offers four Immersive Expeditions, which include traveling through paleo-landscapes from 3.5 billion years ago to present day, in addition to adventures involving the Notre-Dame cathedral, pyramid of Khufu and an Impressionist exhibit in 1874 Paris.
“You can really walk into those corridors… and see those objects exactly like in real life,” Barati says. “And you can do that in very large spaces… and you can do that with other people. You are with your friend, your family or colleagues, and you can see each other and live, share and experience all these adventures together.”
He sees virtual reality as a social experience.
“This really feels like a success when we see a family removing the headset and being very happy and chatting with each other,” Barati says. “And when they ask each other… ‘Did you see that? Did you understand that?’”
Content is still king
Humanity has always used storytelling as a means to connect and share knowledge. Virtual reality brings that story to life, transforming worlds you’ve only seen hanging beneath a glass frame into reality.
“Those objects were not meant to be displayed,” Barati says. “They were meant to be used. And so, what we do with virtual reality… is create the context so we can see those objects being used a thousand years ago by the very people [who] created them and used them.”
Virtual reality storytelling also puts humans at the center by having participants interact with key figures, which deepens the emotional link participants have to the topic.
“When you interact, it enhances the immersion and you are more into the moment and you learn more, you understand better, etc.,” he adds.
Each Immersive Expedition runs nearly 45 minutes in length. During that time, a character—like Mona, a young Egyptologist who gives special tours of the pyramid of Khufu, or Rose, a Parisian aspiring writer—will guide the group through the narrative as history unfolds.
Education is an important component of the expeditions. Excurio partners with renowned experts and institutions, including museum curators and paleontologists, to ensure the historical accuracy of its content.
“You will meet some characters and be guided into a specific story,” Barati says. “You will learn a lot, but you will [do so] without realizing it because it’s part of the story.”
Building an expedition is a large-scale production, akin to creating a video game. To reconstruct the environment, the monuments and the characters from when dinosaurs roamed the Earth or the Impressionists exhibited their work, Barati’s company uses 3D graphics and works with a team of 3D designers, 3D animators, developers and actors.
“What is the most important is the content,” he says. “It’s the content and the quality of content that is attracting our audience. It’s not the technology; it’s not the concept. It’s not the format; it’s really the content.”
The cinema business model
Barati believes that the Immersive Expeditions business model is similar to that of movie theaters. Excurio currently partners with 20 venues to show its expeditions. The company hopes in the future to feature its expeditions in thousands of venues worldwide, like movies playing in theaters.
But while you’re limited to one movie per room in a theater, you can conduct several Immersive Expeditions simultaneously in the same venue.
“That means that… in this big space, you can have groups of people walking into their own experience,” Barati says. “Some can be in Egypt; others can be in the Impressionist era.”
An Immersive Expedition could also be a featured exhibit at a venue for years, while movies only stay in theaters for a few weeks.
The next frontier
As this new pathway to entertainment builds more traction (even pop queen Sabrina Carpenter is in on the game, headlining a virtual reality concert last summer) and the technology continues to improve, Barati is driven to stay ahead of the competition.
His company plans a wider rollout of their current expeditions. Excurio is also at work on its next adventure, which will take place in the medieval era.
“I feel we are like the cinema industry a hundred years ago, trying to create this new ecosystem, including the creators, the distributors and the operators,” Barati says. “We are at the very beginning of that with the Immersive Expeditions.”
This article appears in the May/June 2025 issue of SUCCESS magazine. Photo courtesy of Excurio.
Quelle:
https://www.success.com/virtual-reality-immersive-expeditions/
