Marriott Hotels is ramping up its technology credentials with the trial of a new service that lets guests beckon virtual reality (VR) headsets to their rooms.
Partnering with Samsung for the initiative, Marriott is testing the so-called “VRoom Service” over a two-week period at the New York Marriott Marquis and London Marriott Park Lane hotels.
This isn’t Marriott’s first foray into VR, however. Last September, the hotel chain announced #GetTeleported, which was basically a “teleporter” booth featuring the Oculus Rift DK2 VR headset and headphones, as well as 4D sensory elements such as wind, to give you more realistic virtual guided tours of Hawaii and London.
For its latest boundary-pushing project, the company is offering Samsung Gear VR headsets and headphones, delivered direct to a guest’s bedroom where they can enjoy an “in-room virtual reality travel experience.”
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“Our guests want to be in inventive spaces that help foster their creativity and thinking,” says Matthew Carroll, vice president at Marriott Hotels. “VRoom combines storytelling with technology, two things that are important to next generation travelers.”
Timed to coincide with the VRoom Service, Marriott is also launching an all-new VR content platform that it’s calling “VR Postcards,” which it says are “intimate and immersive travel stories that users experience in 360 3D via a virtual reality headset.”
In effect, you follow an actual traveler (i.e. someone having fun) on their journey, where you’re regaled with their personal stories. At launch, the VR Postcards cover an ice-cream shop in Rwanda, Chile’s Andes Mountains, and the streets of Beijing.
If VR isn’t your thing, then you can always turn on Netflix instead — Marriott inked a deal with the video-streaming giant earlier this year to let you watch Netflix movies and TV shows on your hotel room TV.
