There’s no doubt that the arrival of Netflix has allowed us to get immersed in our favourite TV shows like never before. Being able to lose ourselves in a Netflix marathon whenever we want to is one of the best things about the streaming service but could it become even more immersive over time?
How Streaming is Helping Other Industries Become More Immersive
This isn’t the only way that streaming has turned traditional hobbies and activities into something far more immersive. For example, immersive sports streaming lets us feel closer to the action whether we’re in the stadium or watching at home. In this case, augmented reality and virtual reality are used to help the spectators enjoy all the action in a new way.
We can spot another example in the world of live blackjack, with the human dealers streamed live onto the site’s varied games. This means that players can choose from various immersive games where they try to reach 21 in a genuine casino atmosphere. This same approach has been applied to other casino games like roulette and baccarat, adding to the variety on offer.
The Japanese Pop-Up Experience
A new pop-up experience opened by Netflix in Tokyo has given fans of a few of their most popular shows the chance to experience them in a new kind of way. It’s divided into a romantic section, featuring the likes of Emily in Paris and Bridgerton, and an adventurous experience focussing on shows including Strangers Things and Alice in Borderland.
Fans can try a survival game, revisit some of their favourite scenes, and see the real props from these shows. This is simply the latest experience of Netflix pop-ups, with others appearing in cities such as London and Los Angeles, giving a way of building a real-life relationship with the shows and the characters that they watch on the screen.
Spatial Sound
Listening to the action is becoming more immersive too, thanks to Netflix’s use of spatial audio. This produces a 360-degree sound even when you listen on a normal television or smartphone, making you feel that you can hear people walking down a street or objects flying past you just as you would in real life.
Over 700 Netflix titles now have spatial sound, which works by splitting the sound into two channels. To try this audio experience, you need to subscribe to the most expensive premium plan with them, which has Ultra HD and the chance to download content to up to six devices to watch offline at any time.
The Series That Got Shown in a Unique Order to Everyone
The next step to a more personalized and unique streaming experience can be seen in the way that Netflix previously launched a series that each viewer could see in any order. Black Mirror: Bandersnatch is a story of a master thief that is told in a non-linear approach so that everyone gets a different idea of the characters depending upon the order in which they see the story unfold and feels more immersed in the story as though it were a real-life situation.
These examples let us see how we can look forward to more immersive entertainment in the future, with the latest technology used to help us feel wrapped up in what we see more than ever before.
