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Thread: The OT thread V1

  1. #2911
    So I became a US Citizen yesterday . A bit surreal and exhausting after how long the process has been.

  2. #2912
    Insider new ion?'s Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by pbjosh View Post
    Nah, Golf works. For $20 a head you can walk around 100 acres with a $2500 bag of clubs and take 4-10 hours in a day to do it and barely be within shot range of a paintball gun most of the time. Right in town and areas with higher cost per acre. Paintball is lower overhead than that.

    The problem with PB is most of the demographic is 16-24, and brokeish, and most of the Golfers are at a far better place economically. And Golf is established, so they look at a field as a 30 year investment and can get solid backers, where as most people's experience is a small backyard field that the original budget is a tax return or two, or a poorly run side business. Golf uses far more space generally per person, and take in significantly less per head per acre. Though, they also have drink carts.

    That being said, the AR requirement can fit the Golf model for outdoor, in fact it can be significantly cheaper I suspect, since you can pack more people in a few acres to pretend to be WOW characters and fight AR dragons. Indoor, AR could do better than a Gymnastics building. It is $150 to $225 to rent a huge gymnasium for a birthday party where a dozen kids run around in a padded room. You could put 30 to 40 adults in the same area with padded swords pretending they are lightsabers for $20 a head per hour for significantly more profit per hour. Shoot, the little 7D rides and even the Ferris wheel next door to us in Pigeon Forge are $15-$20 to get through, and they are lame compared to AR.

    The demographic for AR have higher paying jobs, and would cover a larger age range 10-50yo, who have a decent amount of disposable income, and birthday parties would be a big hit. Just look at the simple popularity of Pokemon Go, the lightest AR possible. It was a huge, for a limited time. If AR can be done in a cleared out Garage or spare room, a backyard or a spare chunk of cleared land and WiFi linked to a solid computer, I think it can beat the PB model in many ways. If linked, well, it might be closer to Ready Player 1 than we want to admit. If you don't need a specific AR field to go play at, cost to get in might be a $1500 setup but after that it is just buying software and some prop upgrades. How many people drop that on video games?



    I agree with Steve on this.

    As for paintball crossing over - I see it as two different industries for the most part. Paintball has mostly machined gear that actually has to fire something, clothing, paint. Nothing really transfers over, short of maybe clothing. 90% of what would make decent AR work is headgear, injected plastic props with IoT, and lots of sexy software.

    Though, inflatable bunkers and AR? Huge potential there.

    What PB should try and do, in my opinion, is work to end up more like a video game. After challenges and courses that work like a FPS, work to give you a $20 ride type of experience. Thousands of people do the Zombie Hunt paintball courses, and that is it, because they still like the 'real' feel of it. Updating the game so it feels more like a video game, and I think you would have the best way to compete with AR. Or even augment the game. Adding AR to PB can result in the Video Game feel (maps, tracking, building in upgrades that give you semi-auto or related) and that would give you a hybrid that can feel incredibly real, yet far more.
    IDK if the US is different, but golf courses around here are closing quite frequently. They're too large of a land investment for the payoff when that land can be used for housing etc. We have a golf course locally that also has a sand volleyball court that straight up said "the volleyball is where most of our money comes from" to me.

    Quote Originally Posted by Simon View Post
    So I became a US Citizen yesterday . A bit surreal and exhausting after how long the process has been.
    Fantastic to hear! Congratulations. That's a nice feeling. JW, how does citizenship work for your daughter?

  3. #2913

  4. #2914
    Insider PBSteve's Avatar
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    Congratulations!
    Ever so many citizens of this republic think they ought to believe that the Universe is a monarchy, and therefore they are always at odds with the republic. -Alan Watts

    I work for the company building the Paragon

  5. #2915
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    IDK if the US is different, but golf courses around here are closing quite frequently. They're too large of a land investment for the payoff when that land can be used for housing etc. We have a golf course locally that also has a sand volleyball court that straight up said "the volleyball is where most of our money comes from" to me.
    That is happening quite a bit here also - I believe because Golf is driven by the economy, much like paintball is. Even that said, Knoxville has a couple small paintball fields way out of town (hour drive at least) and Golf has nearly 30 in the same area, including a Municipal one. It doesn't have a good profit ratio it seems, compared to paintball, and with raising land cost and as cities develop, they do get eaten up. The reason they get funded though does have a lot to do with longer term loans and cheap (at the time) land.

    So I became a US Citizen yesterday . A bit surreal and exhausting after how long the process has been.
    Congrats! I know some people who have gone through it, and it is brutal. We seriously need an overhaul of that system.
    Josh Coray
    J4 Paintball
    Lead Design
    www.j4paintball.com

  6. #2916
    Insider PBSteve's Avatar
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    Here in California most golf courses enjoy massive property tax breaks, which is why there are courses in the middle of Los Angeles. Wouldn't be surprised if it happened elsewhere.
    Ever so many citizens of this republic think they ought to believe that the Universe is a monarchy, and therefore they are always at odds with the republic. -Alan Watts

    I work for the company building the Paragon

  7. #2917
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    Congrats, Simon!

    Relevant to AR/sports:
    https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2...f-drone-racing

    The falling cost of commercial real estate is also a big player. I do think that "Holodecks" will become fairly common before the equipment reaches the ability to simulate larger spaces well. However you can add tactility to the space is going to be crucial, though.

    A big question in my mind is, what can you do with a really accessible floorprint size of ~3000 square feet? It's not big enough for indoor paintball, but you could make something a lot more compelling than laser tag. Escape rooms do really well, on account of their name. But, you basically go once. "Myst" type experiences could be almost infinite in a virtual version of that with a few tactile props per software package - similar to the "7D" movie model, actually.

    The economics are pretty reasonable, if we take $500/sqft as a "mall" benchmark, a reasonably sized 3k sqft storefront needs 1.5M in sales, across call it 300 active days. That's an average churn of 16 people per hour, for 8hours at a $40 price point. Arguably that's high since this is capital intensive but with a great margin, compared to the slim margins of retail.
    "So you've done this before?"
    "Oh, hell no. But I think it's gonna work."

  8. #2918
    Insider new ion?'s Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Simon View Post
    Thank you. My Daughter was born here so was a US Citizen way before her Mother and I.
    Made me look this up: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birth_...#North_America

    Looks like both countries grant citizenship for all those born in the country. Good. Some interesting points in there!

    Interesting that US citizens are taxed even when not living in country though.

  9. #2919
    pewpewpew vijil's Avatar
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    https://zerolatencyvr.com/ is one to watch, though the buy in is $1m

    There's a few sites up and running already. It's AR in the sense that you hold a gun and walk around a real space wearing a headset. They can use tricks (elevators and pure game tricks) to make the virtual space seem far larger, and of course it lets you play against people in other locations. The potential is pretty big, but I'd be wary to invest because of how fast the tech is moving right now.

    As for what PB companies should do, I think HK has the right idea with Meta Threads. They're getting into eSports.
    https://www.instagram.com/vijil/
    I draw guns and spaceships and bunnies

  10. #2920
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    This one has John@Dye written all over it

    https://dspace.mit.edu/bitstream/han...pdf?sequence=2
    "So you've done this before?"
    "Oh, hell no. But I think it's gonna work."

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