Our task: to showcase the breadth of Watson’s capabilities in a fun and engaging way that appeals to developers, to demonstrate how Watson empowers users to easily find the insights they need to take action, and to encourage our audience to take the next step and connect with an IBM expert to learn more.

Transform dissonant worlds, one Watson insight at a time.

Though IBM Watson is well known, it’s a complex technology and many businesses struggle to understand how it works, why it’s relevant for them and how it can help them – including developers, our main target.

Based on the insight that over 90% of developers are avid gamers, we designed a web-based gaming experience that immerses users into the worlds of three Watson success stories – tapping into the unique challenges within each story to show how Watson helps businesses transform their operations from dissonance to harmony by uncovering actionable insights.

Users have the chance to play three distinct levels aligned to the three stories, where they travel through 3D worlds and work to transform each environment into its audio-visual “harmonic state” by capturing and capitalizing on Watson’s insights.

Through research, we discovered that our target audience (developers and IT engineers) are also passionate about gaming (over 90% of developers). While creating a gaming experience for this audience seemed like a no-brainer, we also wanted to ensure it had wider appeal.

By equating the challenges and successes that businesses face to dissonant and harmonious sounds and visuals, we felt we could develop a compelling audio-visual gaming experience that allowed for high-level storytelling while also creating enough substance around Watson’s solutions and capabilities – and how they work – for our developer audience to want to dig in deeper.

Each level is brought to life through a combination of generative graphics, evolving music, responsive audio and rich storytelling. ??The levels are distinguished by a particular theme, built around a key benefit that each Watson solution helped the client achieve. Each level is inspired by elements from the story it’s telling. For Humana, which has to do with customer service, we implemented a complex web of fiber optic cables that gradually untangle via the gameplay, along with music and sound design representative of poor patient care, as the user eventually achieves ‘connection.’ For The Weather Channel, we incorporated a dense fog of clouds, particles and thunder, along with music and sound design representing chaos and misinformation, ultimately resolving with the user achieving ‘clarity.’ For ESPN Fantasy Football, we implemented a complex environment of pillars representing football players rising and falling in the ranks, along with music and sound design showcasing the transition from a negative fantasy football experience to a consistently reliable one, as the user achieves ‘confidence.’

Along the way, Watson is introduced into the storytelling, analyzing the environment and revealing collectible insights (represented as illuminated orbs). As the user captures these insights, elements begin to lock into rhythm and order, and the gameplay becomes easier.

The experience was built using a lightweight webgl framework designed to deliver smooth 3D graphics in a web browser. As users go through the experience, different sections of the build load in the background. This ensures users don’t get stuck with a long load timer at the start of the experience. The experience is quickly accessible across devices and browsers. Users can load up and play on desktop, mobile or tablet devices and if the experience is shared, it can also seamlessly boot up on social browsers like Facebook and Instagram.

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The game has a 77% engagement rate, exceeding KPI targets and performance benchmarks.

IBM received 134 new business leads from the IBM Think 2021 event experience alone, which was where the game was launched.

3.1 minutes are the average time spent in the game

First-ever real-time audio-visual synchronization, enabled by Klang audio engine