The AR game “Overbeast,” powered by VERIZON’s 5G network, launched in the U.S. in spring 2023. WOW was responsible for the character design, modeling, and animation of the beasts featured in the game. By leveraging 5G pixel streaming, the project aimed to deliver a grander, more vivid visual experience than had previously been possible with AR. Based on the concept of “kings of each animal kingdom with special abilities,” the beasts were designed in both juvenile and adult forms. Various simulations were used to emphasize each creature’s individuality, bringing them to life as dynamic beings. In addition, while the animation speed was slowed down to make the beasts feel massive, battle actions were made quick, creating a sense of both realistic scale and unreal speed to heighten immersion and realism in the game world. OVERBEAST: https://www.overbeast.world/

“Scroll Spatial Comic” is a work that uses vertically scrolling manga displayed on a smartphone or tablet as its interface. As you wear a head-mounted display and read through the vertical-scroll manga on your smartphone, a volumetric video that recreates the content of the panel positioned at the center of the screen unfolds before your eyes. As you advance to the next panel, the volumetric video corresponding to that panel appears, and as you move back to the previous panel, it returns to the volumetric video corresponding to that earlier panel. This makes viewers aware that manga contains time and space within each panel, and that the narrative within the manga progresses as the frames known as panels transition in sequence. In this work, manga serves as a medium through which the time and space of volumetric video can be manipulated.

At Expo 2025 Osaka-Kansai Expo, in the dedicated theater “499 Seconds: My Gattai” within the Signature Pavilion “Shin-Life Adventure” produced by Shoji Kawamori, 30 participants don VR headsets equipped with cameras and, through VR and MR technologies, simultaneously experience a universe-scale food chain—traveling beyond time and space from memories of the past in an immersive exhibition available nowhere else in the world. Through the “universe-scale food chain” envisioned by Shoji Kawamori, creator of numerous sci-fi works, visitors can experience the pavilion’s theme: “Life is fusion and transformation!” We were responsible for the direction and animation of this hyperspace theater “499 Seconds: My Gattai,” and, using spatial audio technology developed by SoVeC Inc. and Terasaka Bio Inc., we combined it with spatial audio produced by Sony PCL Inc. (hereafter Sony PCL), delivering a completely new audiovisual experience unlike anything before.