IMMERSIVE INTERACTIVE DESIGN
& CONSULTING
How do you bring gamification to your brand activation, theme park, event, FEC, historical site, experience? How expensive/difficult is it to add interactives to your space? How do you create the type of immersive experience guests are clamoring for?
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Wild Optimists can help.
We love working with clients to understand their goals, budgets, pain points and limitations, so we can dream up exciting ways to captivate and delight their audience within those parameters. Working together can be as simple as a consultation call or working with you through every step of the process from concept to final product.
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Deliverables:
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Idea Decks full of exciting new ways to create immersive interactives in your experience.
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Day one interactive and narrative design to create magical experiences for your guests.
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Consultation on how to gamify existing spaces.
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Feedback on how to alter your existing asset for even more engagement and fun.
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"We knew we needed a team that not only brought unmatched creativity and craftsmanship, but also good old fashioned professionalism. That’s what the Wild Optimists bring to the projects on which we continue to collaborate. We always know we’re in the best hands."”
Josh Sugarman, Area 15
AREA 15: Origin queST
​How do you entertain guests while they wait?
A web and installation based interactive "Origin Quest" that gives guests a mystery to solve between ticket times.
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​How do you make your space an immersive world?
Through a series of puzzles that let's your guests discover a story as they explore your space, discovering all your offerings along the way.
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How do you increase perceived guest ROI?
By providing a unique activity providing guests with more to do and a reason to stay.
“Clue: A Walking Experience is easily the most wonderfully fun experience I’ve done in a long time. Key to my enjoyment is The Wild Optimist’ fantastic puzzle design…For the first time ever, a game of Clue is an actual mystery requiring real detective work.”
Patrick B. McLean, No Proscenium
CLUE: A WALKING MYSTERY EXPERIENCE
HASBRO & RIGHT ANGLE
How do you immerse guests in a beloved IP?
Make them the hero, by placing them in the story with a goal to accomplish.
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Within narrow rights parameters how do you create a compelling attraction?
By finding the brand organic touchpoints and creatively expanding on them for an experience that honors the brand and delights the fans.
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How do you integrate actors and interactives in a cost effective way?
Through precise narrative crafting that utilizes actors only at the most memorable moments. With carefully sourced and craftily designed analog interactives.
WINNER: OUTSTANDING IMMERSIVE WORK IN CHICAGO, NO PROSCENIUM AUDIENCE AWARDS
ELECTRIC FOREST MUSIC FESTIVAL
PUZZLE QUEST: 2019-2025
How do you turn 50,000 music festival patrons into a family?
Give strangers an excuse to talk to each other through the shared goal of a puzzle quest.
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How do you increase guest engagement with your interactives?
Iterate, play test, engage with the fans IRL and on social platforms.
Over 5 festivals guest participation in the Time Travel Agency puzzle quest increased from 7,000 to 25,000 guests.
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How do you set your experience apart from the competition?
Create an immersive interactive that rewards guests with exclusive access.
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WINNER: THEA 2025 RECOGNITION OF MERIT
"Nobody comes close to the artistry, flair and ingenuity that Ariel and Juliana bring to every project. Having worked with them on large scale TV-focused projects and smaller scale personal ones, it’s immediately apparent from the very beginning of working together why they are the best in the business."
Bryan Seabury, EVP CBS Studios
“Ariel and Juliana are a super creative team and thoughtful designers. I’m always excited to see what they come up with and can’t wait to play their next game!”
Brian Yu, Mattel
GAYLORD TEXAS:
DC COMIC's UNIVERSE OF LIGHT
MARRIOTT & BRIAN MORROW PRODUCTIONS
How do you ensure optimal throughput in a walkthrough experience?
Give guests a quest that rewards them for continuing through the space.
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How do you make something interactive when guests can't touch the display? And character interactions without actors?
Create a custom comic book with puzzles that tie to your visuals and with your experience's characters asking the guests for help.
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How do you create a cohesive experience that is beautiful and interactive?
Bring the Wild Optimists in early in the design process so interactive elements can be organically integrated into the design.
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"The perfect collaborators for game play and immersive storytelling."
Justin Fix, JFI
TRAITORS: LIVE EXPERIENCE
PEACOCK & JUST FIX IT PRODUCTIONS
How do you turn strangers into friends?
Create a game that goes deep, fast, while staying fun.
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How do you encourage nice people to be the "bad guys"?
By creating game mechanics that reward socially acceptable deception.
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How do you uplevel an experience that is already getting rave reviews?
Recognize the expertise of the lead creatives and surgically fix the pain points they are looking to fix.
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WINNER: THEA 2026 RECOGNITION OF MERIT
"Working with the Wild Optimist team was fun! The ladies are very smart and creative. They are very knowledgeable about their craft and it was exciting to see how their work came to life through the experience of our visitors! The effort they put to understand how their ideas would unfold was remarkable. They are patient, pleasant and easy to work with. Looking forward to phase 2 of our project!"
Candace Rampasard, Chukka
CHUKKA GRAND TURK:
prison tales
How do you gamify a museum?
Recreate a room instead of creating an exhibit.
Have guests listen to first person monologues of historical events, rather than plaques with third person history.
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How do you turn facts into memorable takeaways?
Have guests discover the history through a game and quest.
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What if guests don't want to play a game?
Provide a beautiful setting and interesting stories that are fun to engage with whether you play or not.
"“It has been our great pleasure to work with the clever folks at Wild Optimists. We are always amazed at the joy, surprise and success of their creative concepts that liven up our attractions in new, imaginative ways for our guests. Wild Optimists are the best kind of optimists!""
Charlotte Huggins, CEO, Miziker Entertainment
GAYLORD HOTELS:
SO MUCH CHRISTMAS
How do you avoid way finding frustration in a scavenger hunt?
With clever poems that feel like riddles, even though they are simply directions.
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How do you make a game that is fun for little kids and their families?
With innovative interactives that don't require reading.
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In an event full of lines, what can you provie that doesn't require waiting?
A high through put adventure quest with interactives designed to be done by many people at the same time.
“Working with The Wild Optimists was like finding the key to unlocking the mysteries of great collaboration. But, it’s no secret, Juliana and Ariel are just the best at what they do. Great listeners, brilliant creators and beyond fun to work with."
Chris Grap, Mall of America
MALL OF AMERICA: MYSTERY COVE
Mystery Cove is an ambitious new waterpark coming soon from the Mall of America. We worked with them to design an overarching narrative for the park that included mysteries down every slide. The goal was to improve the guest experience in 3 main areas:
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•Queue Games - We turned the most boring part of any theme park into its own delightful experience with a variety of games and quests.
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•Mini Games - All of the zones in Mystery Cove are alive with surprises! We designed stand alone interactions that were their own reward.
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•Mystery Quests - Mystery Cove is so much more than the slides. Guests can choose to spend their day immersed in epic quests, meeting characters, discovering hidden lore, completing challenges, and decoding cryptic clues.
"Talented, Professional, and always open to innovation, the Wild Optimist are a great team to look at for interactive elements in both events and products."
Ivan Van Norman, Critical Role, Hunters Entertainment
DTLA PROUD & WEEDMAPS
HISTORY PUZZLE QUEST
How to you make DTLA pride even more fun?? With puzzles about cannabis!
Weedmaps hired the Wild Optimists to take their DTLA booth to the next level, increasing customer engagement and brand ambassadorship. Rather than simply being handed a piece of merch, players had to earn it by solving puzzles throughout the festival.
The quest featured cryptic rainbow pennants, a photo booth hiding a smoky secret, and a perfectly instagram-able pool full of giant inflatable joints. After solving each puzzle, players received not only their unique prize, but a keepsake postcard illuminating the intersecting history of the cannabis movement and the gay rights movement.
"We know that everyone, especially families, are looking for safe and fun activities, and we are lucky to have puzzle masters like the Wild Optimists and an open-air space to make it happen!"
Negin Singh, Santa Monica Pier
santa monica pier
secret story tours
For their 110th anniversary, the Pier wanted to do something unique and memorable to celebrate their history.
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They hired us to create an official historical tour as a puzzle quest. So we created a custom app that showcases the history of the pier in a safe and socially distanced way.
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Rather than lecturing players about history, it comes alive in their hands, inviting them to discover the mysteries lying just beneath the surface. A tiered hint system means the tour is fun and accessible for both novice players and experienced puzzlers.
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Finally, it provides unique opportunities to hold history in your hands, and then take an exclusive photo to share with the world.
"Ariel and Juliana are two of the most thoughtful and versatile creatives I have had the pleasure of working with. Their expertise and deep knowledge of the game world make them invaluable to any project, big or small.”
Tommy Honton, Stash House, Museum of Selfies
LOST LANDS MUSIC FESTIVAL
PUZZLE QUEST
Lost Lands was already a well established festival beloved for their iconic DJs and giant animatronic dinosaurs. In 2021, they wanted to make it even more interactive and immersive, and brought in the Wild Optimists to create a puzzle quest throughout the Forsaken Forest.
The quest was playable at any time so that it could be enjoyed between sets. The puzzles were designed in such a way so that multiple people could all play them at the same time, ensuring there wouldn’t be any annoying bottlenecks. The puzzles were scattered throughout the forest, inviting players to peer into bird’s nests, study dinosaur patterns, and look for some very unusual foliage. It all culminated in a giant dinosaur nest, where questers needed to find the exact right egg and use it to open a mysterious boulder, revealing the end of the story and their keepsake prize!
“Loved working with Juliana & Ariel. They created a magical experience for our Anti-Gala. It got attendees making new friends and playing together in a matter of seconds. Can’t wait to find more things to build together."
Brent Bushnell, Two Bit Circus
TWO BIT CIRCUS
GALA GAME
Two Bit Circus hosted a 500+ person gala to raise money for their amusement park.
The challenge we were presented with was how to make dinner fun and get the energy up before the auction so people would be more willing to spend.
Our answer: A puzzle quest that was ”discovered” after the salad plate was removed and revealed that the centerpiece was actually a machine you needed to build (by solving puzzles.) Once solved, it spit out gold coins that could be used to purchase a prize.
This event included video games, circus performers and a cocktail making robot, but on a poll of the biggest donors after the event our game was cited as the most fun of the evening.
