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To Boldly Go... - Bridge Command Interview with Owen Kingston
During our time at MCM Comic Con London, we spoke with Parabolic Theatre's artistic director to learn all about their unique and exciting immersive theatre experience.
Audio transcription
"Hello everyone, and welcome back to Gamereactor.
Today, as you might be able to tell, judging by Owen's amazing getup here, and also the wonderful backdrop we've got, I'm here at the Bridge Command booth at MCM Comic Con London."
"Owen, you're the Artistic Director, and well, let's just say that what you're doing here is really quite unique and different.
So for people who, and I'm gonna say people, I'd say the majority of people who are aware of what Bridge Command is, tell us a little bit about it."
"So it's a live-action starship simulator.
And what we've got in our facility in Vauxhall is two better-than-movie-quality starship sets, where there isn't a single button that doesn't do something."
"So you have a fully-functioning starship that you and your friends can fly and go off on adventures in.
Like many different science fiction TV shows, you gotta be the star."
"And what makes this different, then, to, you know, people might be drawing comparisons to escape rooms and whatnot.
Tell us, how does this differentiate from it?
So you can play this, like, an unlimited number of times."
"We have a huge roster of different missions.
And when you book, you can choose between four different mission types, military, exploration, intrigue, and diplomacy, which gives you the sort of flavor of mission that you get to play."
"But there are multiple different missions in each of those mission types.
So you can just keep coming back and back.
You're always in, you know, we've got two different starships, so you can fly one of the two each time you come."
"But there's so many different cool toys on board, things to play with.
We never touch everything in one mission.
So whenever you come back, there's always new things to do."
"Unlike an escape room, where once you've played it, you've kind of played it.
You can't really go back and do the same one again and have it be a surprise."
"So tell us about some of those different missions, then, because obviously you say, you know, it's inspired by Star Trek and some of the amazing missions and stories that are in that show."
"So tell us, what sort of things can people expect to experience?
So we have a team of live actors that work alongside it.
So you come on and you and your friends or the crew of the ship, you fly the ship, but you'll be interacting with our actors at all kinds of different points."
"And they will play like all of the possible characters that you could meet.
So if you imagine like a type of science fiction TV show, you know, you get different regular recurring tropes."
"In our military missions, they're like the big space battle ones where you go out and you fight bad guys and you do that kind of cool stuff."
"But you also have the diplomacy missions where you end up negotiating or trying to help soothe tensions between different groups.
So it kind of depends what sort of angle on the sci-fi you really enjoy."
"You know, if you want to come be Captain Kirk and go around the place blowing stuff up and who cares the consequences, you can do that.
Similarly, if you want to cosplay as Captain Picard and you want to come along and sort of try and, you know, be the guy in the big chair, making sure everybody gets along with each other, you can do that too."
"We've tried to sort of cater for all those different possibilities.
And I was reading a bit into it beforehand and it's not just about individual experiences here."
"What you've built is a universe that kind of grows and changes depending on the missions you do, right?
Yeah, that's right.
And we keep moving the time along and along."
"So we've just started our second season.
So we've just got a whole bunch of new missions that are about to launch and we'll be retiring some of our older missions."
"So if people have come before and they've played a lot of the missions before, there's a whole lot of new content that's about to drop, which is really exciting."
"And that's interesting.
It's introducing new ideas to the world.
And because we track what our players do from mission to mission in our database, we try and pivot the stories around so that it kind of draws together a campaign for you, so that they're like a role-playing campaign, you know?
So that the different stories link together for you and everybody's journey through the show is unique in that sense."
"And tell me then a little bit, how about how you go about ensuring that, you know, you keep iterating and improving on the formula.
Again, you say you're in your second season, so you've done a round of this before and now you're back."
"So how is it expanding?
Well, we've started doing these special events, which are on Saturday nights.
We don't do them every Saturday night."
"We do them about once a month.
But there's a much longer show where you can come for a whole evening and you do multiple linked missions."
"And those are the things where we're really advancing the story.
So in the first season, we had a treaty signing between different factions in the area of space where the show is set."
"And the results of that have carried forward.
So the stuff that the players did on that night has permanently affected the world of the show, which is really fun."
"And so what's the plan then overall then?
You're in your second season, you're doing these events.
I assume the sky's the limit at this point then for Bridge Command."
"It is, yeah.
I mean, you know, we keep thinking year to year.
So we're already starting to plan out what we'll do for our third season, which we will probably be launching around this time next year."
"But we're also, yeah, we're looking at how we can expand on different parts of our set as well.
So as I say, we've got two Starship sets.
We've got a small off-ship location at the moment, which can be space station stuff where you can leave the ship and kind of go on an away mission."
"We're hoping to expand how, like the area that we've got set aside for those away missions so you can have more elaborate times doing that.
But that's still in the works."
"That might take a while to come through, so yeah.
So it's quite a niche idea this.
I don't think many people are doing it.
What's your current location for people who might be interested in checking it out?
So we're in Vauxhall, central London."
"We're right opposite the MI6 building.
Although if you've seen Bonds, that's right opposite our venue.
So we're next to Vauxhall Tube Station."
"So you can get a Vauxhall Tube Station.
It's on the Victoria Line.
You come out the Tube Station, you can basically see our venue."
"And that's where we are.
Have you had any thoughts about expanding outside of London?
Yeah, a few.
We've had some people who've asked us about, can we do this overseas?
So there's a lot of American folk who are interested in us building something over there."
"But we've also got a guy in Germany who's really keen.
So we're hoping that might be the first place that we expand, but that's still a way off.
I don't think that'll be happening this year."
"It's going to take time to do all that stuff.
So for people who might be interested in checking out a British Command and going and experiencing this for themselves, what's a tip you'd give for people that have never done it before and trying to sort of break into it?
I think come in with an open mind and be prepared to get stuck in."
"So you can book out a private show for you and your friends.
And I think that's the best way of experiencing it personally.
But you can also just book an individual ticket and come and play alongside people you've never met and just be open and do your best to get on with people and really throw yourself into it."
"That's the best thing you can do, really.
Don't hold back, just throw yourself into it and you'll get the best out of it that way.
As a final question then Owen, for people who are going to come and check it out, what sort of dates?
When are your shows lined up?
When are the sets lined up?
We run Tuesday to Sunday every week."
"So we only take Mondays off.
And on the weekends, we run all days.
We start at 10 in the morning and we run all the way into the evening."
"We've got loads of availability.
Just book a slot and come down.
The price is flexible depending on what day of the week it comes."
"If you come on the weekends then it's most expensive.
If you come on a Tuesday evening, that's when it's cheapest.
So yeah, knock yourselves out."
"Knock yourselves out.
Definitely come and check this out.
Honestly, it's a really interesting idea you guys have got here.
And well, season two, we'll see about season three."
"We'll see about Germany, all these different things.
The sky's the limit.
Bridge Command, make sure to check it out.
And for more on this, be sure to stay tuned to your local Game Ranter region."
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