Operate & Optimise
The future of sports and games: the active games of Valo Motion
Discover ValoJump and ValoClimb by ELI Play
ELI Play's range of products is constantly expanding. Every season there are new add-ons for your indoor playground. ValoClimb and ValoJump will be added soon. Valo Motion is a Finnish company that has permanently changed the definition of computer games.
The survival of the world is in my hands. I’m getting excited. Everyone looks; failure is not an option. I aim...and bam! And again. Bam! Until my arm muscles start to shake and I can't do it anymore. ‘Game Over’ is on my screen and I make room for my opponent. He steps on the climbing wall and restarts the game. Improving my high score will be quite a job.
The idea
“ValoClimb is the first interactive game platform especially for climbing walls. Everyone can participate, from the smallest children to fanatical climbers.” We talked to Raine Kajastila, CEO of Valo Motion. "The idea for ValoClimb came about when I was working on my postdoctoral research: how can we use technology to motivate people to play sports and how do we teach them the skills they need for that sport?
Viral
“In 2013, I created the very first prototypes in university with some help from computer games professor. After making a research video, I got several requests from the climbing world to make it as a commercial product. Encouraged by this, I set up a team that could do this with me and we turned the promising prototype into a polished product. Hard work over couple of years paid off when we launched the product and introduced a new game Climball: a kind of air hockey that you can also play on the climbing wall. When the video from Climball went live, we had 8 million views within a single weekend. In the weeks that followed, we reached 150 million views and it seemed that everyone wanted ValoClimb. We were suddenly very busy and over one hundred customers in 35 countries.”
ValoClimb, the first interactive game platform for climbing walls
Sports
Valo Motion got off to a flying start. From Finland, they are continuously developing new games and hardware. "The special thing about our products is the combination of challenge, sports and gaming. When a child - or anyone else - plays one of our games, he or she will also get a good dose of exercise. The games also attracts children, who otherwise spend their time behind a computer. A win-win situation!”
ValoJump
In addition to ValoClimb, Valo Motion launched recently ValoJump that supercharges trampolines. The player moves - on a trampoline - through a platform games where points can be earned or enemies defeated. With a choice of different games and more serious training applications, this product offers fun for all ages and levels.
Target group
ValoClimb and ValoJump are both suitable for beginners as well as experienced players. The ideology of Valo Motion is to develop games that they themselves enjoy playing. When games are interesting to adults and hard-core gamers they can be scaled also for children from the age of 5. This can be done for example by setting the game to a smaller area of the climbing wall. Then children don't have to climb that high and it remains safe. Both products are suitable as an add-on for trampoline parks, indoor playgrounds, fitness gyms and climbing gyms. And: the products were also sold to a number of shopping centres last year.
Ready to go
The games are sold as complete packages including software, hardware and a cloud service. And that service goes very far. "We ship the ValoClimb system fully operational. Basically it works already after lifting it out of the box, turning towards a climbing wall and by pluging it in," says Raine and laughs, “However first you want to securely mount it on a tower we provide or attach to the ceiling” he continues. After the system is installed in the playground, the Valo Motion team can remotely see if everything is working properly, and they continue to do so, proactively. "For example, we'll check whether you've positioned the projector correctly on the wall. In addition, we continue to update the software so that the games continue to run smoothly and we automatically install our new games into your system. This way the climbing wall remains interesting for the visitors in the future. In the unlikely event that something goes wrong, Valo Motion has a support service in house to offer technical support. In this way, Valo Motion guarantees a high quality product that works without interruptions.
The only thing you have to arrange is a climbing wall or a trampoline - if you don't already have one. If not, ELI Play can of course also support you in this.
What’s next Raine?
“We continue to develop and update our existing games, but in the meantime, we are also looking at new forms of sports. Our next product will definitely be connected with sports, but we won’t say yet which sport and in what way, that will remain as a surprise.”
Custom-made
Are you looking for something special or do you want a custom-made game? Anything is possible. Together with partners such as Valo Motion, ELI Play continuously develops new products and themes for indoor playgrounds and trampoline parks. Contact ELI Play via info@eliplay.com or +31 (0)411 745 300 for more information on all of Valo Motion's experiences.