DigitalLife 2007: The Virtual Army Experience

By far the most interactive and visceral demo station here at DigitalLife is the America’s Army area tucked in the corner of the convention hall. Called the Virtual Army Experience, groups of attendees are ushered in, registered, tagged, and placed in a real-life situation with real-life weapons — only instead of bullets, everything is laser sighted. I had a chance to not only stop by the booth, but take part in the entire experience myself.

My first stop on the Virtual Army Experience was in a trailer that houses a registration section manned by Virtual Army Experience staff members. Once I gave out all my vital statistics and standard registration information, I was then given a tracking device and card. While waiting for my group’s turn to play, I had the opportunity to either test out the America’s Army game or watch an Army video on multiple screens.

Once my group’s turn came up, we were moved to the main area of the experience. Inside, we were greeted with three different Humvees and a tow missile system. After a quick briefing by an experienced Army Ranger, our group was split up into smaller groups that hopped into the vehicles. Armed with fully-automatic SAW rifles, my Humvee team was ready to do some dirty work.

With three large screens in front of us — think a mini-Imax theater — we were dropped down into a starting point. Our mission was to drive to an extraction point, pick up a high-priority target, and then get the hell out before the enemy had a chance to overtake us. It was a matter of life and death here on multiple levels.

The action started out a bit slow with a civilian or two running by to go hide inside their home before being blasted with a stray bullet. As our Humvees began to roll forward, we were presented with varying degrees of enemies that would either pop out around corners, run out into the street, or rest atop a placement on top of a building. The actual shooting experience was fairly solid. There was a small amount of kickback with the weapon and because it was the real thing, the weight of the gun took its toll over the course of our time inside the truck.

The most random and jolting occasions happened whenever our vehicle would either be pelted with bullets or worst, RPGs. When rockets did hit our vehicle, it creaked and shook just as if we had been badly damaged by a rogue enemy — not fun.

After picking up the target, we then headed out and rode back to safety. Once complete, our group was taken back to another trailer where not only were we debriefed, but treated to a small presentation by a real-life hero, Sergeant Tommy Rieman (read his story here). After hearing Rieman’s heroic combat involvement, he then handed out an award to the top soldier of the entire group. Lucky enough, that top soldier was actually me. I knew I had mowed down a good number of enemies, but didn’t think I’d actually take the top spot — I represented GGL properly.

The Virtual Army Experience is one of the most popular booths here and with reason … it rocks. While even the most realistic videogame experiences can seem visceral, nothing stacks up to actually using real weapons and vehicles in a real-life situation. Not only do you get a better understanding of just what you’d expect if you were somewhere like Iraq, but you get a full appreciation for what these patriots in our Armed Forces go through — it’s a newfound respect that you can only experience with something like this.

I was told a newer version of the Virtual Army Experience is being developed and I actually look forward to a chance to test it out. In the meantime, if you happen to come by DigitalLife this weekend or any other convention the Army might be at, please make sure you take the time to test drive the Virtual Army Experience for yourself. Huah!