Active Reality to provide municipal leisure centres with VR tech

15 May 2024

GLL is one of those companies you have possibly never heard of, but whose activities you’ve likely seen. What’s more, chances are that you have even used their services without realising it. That’s because GLL is the largest operator of municipal leisure centres and other facilities in the United Kingdom, with 240 leisure centres, 120 public libraries and 15 children’s centres in partnership with more than 50 local councils and agencies.

The reason we are introducing GLL is that the organisation has just announced a brand-new partnership with Active Reality, a company that operates free roam, multiplayer, virtual reality arenas throughout the United Kingdom. As a fan of esports in the UK, you may already have heard of them, but even if you haven’t yet, you likely will soon. Active Reality will be providing state-of-the-art gaming technologies, including Virtual Reality games, to GLL municipal leisure centres all over the country.

Major step for mainstream esports in the UK

We often write about the evolution of esports at educational institutes and programs in the UK, as students form an important part of grassroots esports and gaming in the region. If we’re talking about esports in the UK becoming mainstream though, the recently announced partnership between GLL and Active Reality represents a major step as well. Very soon, visitors to GLL-operated leisure centres will have access to brand-new Virtual Reality headsets through which they can play all kinds of games.

Central to the new addition to GLL’s leisure centres will be Active Reality’s own gaming platform on which they base all of their Virtual Reality and motion capture technology. Through the headsets they are providing to the GLL centres, visitors of those centres will get the chance to experience first-hand what these technologies can do in different settings and games, including the cooking game Kitchen Panic, the zombie hunter adventure Death Squad Survival, and the competitive shooter Cyber Clash. The companies are also planning to create their own leagues and locally, competitive events for different games will be organised as well.

“This collaboration marks a significant milestone in the active leisure industry and will enable us to engage with young people who perhaps would otherwise not consider undertaking physical activity or visiting a leisure centre”, says Joe Rham, Customer Experience Director at GLL, “With rising levels of childhood obesity and the associated health risks, finding new ways to encourage young people to exercise is crucially important.”

Alister Robins, the main man behind Active Reality, naturally agrees with Rham and is equally happy with the opportunities ahead. “Our partnership with GLL represents a significant step forward in our mission to get more people active and tackle this critical demographic who often fall out of our industry”, he says, “By combining our immersive technology with GLL’s reach, we can empower large numbers of individuals of all ages and fitness levels to be active and build the foundations necessary for a lifetime of healthier and more active lifestyles.”