Entrepreneur and engineer Bushnell has pivoted Two Bit Circus to digital
Since its launch in 2012, Two Bit Circus has aimed to bring people together “elbow-to-elbow to play, eat, drink, and generally experience life at the highest resolution.”
Now – at a time when the COVID-19 pandemic means that elbow to elbow socialising is a long way from most people’s realities – the team behind Two Bit Circus have pivoted to an online model which enables them to continue to bring the Two Bit community together.
“It’s really been a weird, hard, traumatic time,” Brent Bushnell, the son of Atari co-founder Nolan Bushnell, told Attractions Management.
“Our doors have been closed since March, but we’ve learned that we’re not just a location-based entertainment company, we’re a social entertainment company. Online was always on our roadmap, but it just wasn’t a priority yet. Closing the park made it a priority; we pivoted instantly. With our new Remote offering, we now have a whole online product line that’s so much fun.”
Launched by engineers Brent Bushnell and Eric Gradman, Two Bit Circus started by creating interactive experiences and brand activations for festivals and corporate events. STEAM Carnival followed, a touring, pop-up-style event with the aim of creating a positive narrative around the STEM subjects (science, technology, engineering and maths) with the addition of art (the A in STEAM), which helped to combat the ‘boring’ stigma of traditional STEM subjects and encouraged “creative, out-of-the-box thinking necessary for engineers and future inventors”.
The event, which reimagined the traditional carnival using “robots, fire and lasers,” kicked off in Los Angeles and San Francisco, before expanding worldwide in 2019.
In 2018, Bushnell and Gradman launched the first of a planned series of micro amusement parks in Los Angeles, providing a permanent home for a range of immersive entertainment games and experiences. Attractions at the 40,000sq ft entertainment complex include a range of immersive adventures such as story rooms, arcade games, private gaming lounges, a games arena and Club01 – described as a “100-seat interactive game show theatre.”
TWO BIT REMOTE With the park closed and the Two Bit team working from home, “the crew went a little stir crazy and channelled their excessive energy into building a platform full of fun games that could bring people together,” says Bushnell.
The Remote offer is a play-from-home show emceed live by an experienced Two Bit Circus human host and “state-of-the-art GameShowBot3000”.
Together they lead players through a variety of games with “hilarious commentary and special guests, selecting lucky players to join live on the air alongside the at-home audience.”
“We built the whole thing from scratch, using some existing tools including Youtube and Amazon’s Cloud, but the software and the game experience is all of our original creation,” said Bushnell. “As well as the public shows – which run every Thursday on a variety of themes – we’re running private shows for teambuilding, birthdays and conferences.”
Two Bit Circus has also created Remote White Label so the software can be used and customised by others, and recently signed its largest white label customer, US family entertainment centre company Main Event.
The company is also scouting possible locations for more micro amusement parks across the US.
“As we perfect the one in LA, the opportunity to move fast with our expansion will become very real,” he said. “Ultimately, I could see room for 100 Two Bit Circus micro amusement parks in the US and 200 in Asia.
“This is a tragic moment for the locations based entertainment industry, but for those that survive there will be unbelievable opportunities on the other side.”
Read more from this issue of Attractions Management magazine
View contents of Attractions Management 2021 issue 1
Editor's letter: Doing better
The Black Lives Matter movement has challenged museums professionals to ask testing questions about their role in reparative history and the way we display and interpret racist and colonial collections
People: Brent Bushnell
Two Bit Circus has pivoted to an innovative online model aimed at keeping its community in touch
People: Michel Linet-Frion
After decades creating for Disney, Grévin and Center Parcs, Linet-Frion has launched his own consultancy
People: Anthony Rawlins
The Digital Visitor CEO explains a new whitepaper on how attractions can survive 2021 and beyond
Interview: Sarah Roots
Warner Bros’ Sarah Roots shares exciting details of the second Harry Potter Studio Tour, set to open in Japan in 2023
Inspired: Alone with Vermeer
The Mauritshuis in The Hague has allowed visitors one-to-one time with Vermeer’s <i>View of Delft</i>, ‘the most beautiful painting in the world’
Aquariums: Into the deep
Merlin and the Sea Life Trust share the highs and lows of the epic journey to get two whales to their new home in the world’s first beluga whale sanctuary in Iceland
Innovation: Sea change
Edge Innovations’ incredibly
life-like robot dolphins could spell the end of marine mammals in aquariums, says CEO Walt Conti
Interview: Bob Rogers
As BRC Imagination Arts celebrates 40 years in business, its founder celebrates his team’s achievements
Sponsored: Technically Creative
With clients including the Xplore
Family Entertainment Centre in Athens,
Technically Creative provides a one
stop, in-house solution to create
memorable and magical experiences.
We talk to CEO, Marc Broadbent
Sponsored: Fun Spot: Providing turnkey solutions
Industry innovator, Fun Spot, is on a roll, with a new EMEA
office and a range of innovative new products to help operators
deliver excellence to the family fun market. We find out more
Interview: Phil Hettema
The Hettema Group president on weathering the pandemic and creating powerful experiences
Entrepreneur and engineer Bushnell has pivoted Two Bit Circus to digital
Since its launch in 2012, Two Bit Circus has aimed to bring people together “elbow-to-elbow to play, eat, drink, and generally experience life at the highest resolution.”
Now – at a time when the COVID-19 pandemic means that elbow to elbow socialising is a long way from most people’s realities – the team behind Two Bit Circus have pivoted to an online model which enables them to continue to bring the Two Bit community together.
“It’s really been a weird, hard, traumatic time,” Brent Bushnell, the son of Atari co-founder Nolan Bushnell, told Attractions Management.
“Our doors have been closed since March, but we’ve learned that we’re not just a location-based entertainment company, we’re a social entertainment company. Online was always on our roadmap, but it just wasn’t a priority yet. Closing the park made it a priority; we pivoted instantly. With our new Remote offering, we now have a whole online product line that’s so much fun.”
Launched by engineers Brent Bushnell and Eric Gradman, Two Bit Circus started by creating interactive experiences and brand activations for festivals and corporate events. STEAM Carnival followed, a touring, pop-up-style event with the aim of creating a positive narrative around the STEM subjects (science, technology, engineering and maths) with the addition of art (the A in STEAM), which helped to combat the ‘boring’ stigma of traditional STEM subjects and encouraged “creative, out-of-the-box thinking necessary for engineers and future inventors”.
The event, which reimagined the traditional carnival using “robots, fire and lasers,” kicked off in Los Angeles and San Francisco, before expanding worldwide in 2019.
In 2018, Bushnell and Gradman launched the first of a planned series of micro amusement parks in Los Angeles, providing a permanent home for a range of immersive entertainment games and experiences. Attractions at the 40,000sq ft entertainment complex include a range of immersive adventures such as story rooms, arcade games, private gaming lounges, a games arena and Club01 – described as a “100-seat interactive game show theatre.”
TWO BIT REMOTE With the park closed and the Two Bit team working from home, “the crew went a little stir crazy and channelled their excessive energy into building a platform full of fun games that could bring people together,” says Bushnell.
The Remote offer is a play-from-home show emceed live by an experienced Two Bit Circus human host and “state-of-the-art GameShowBot3000”.
Together they lead players through a variety of games with “hilarious commentary and special guests, selecting lucky players to join live on the air alongside the at-home audience.”
“We built the whole thing from scratch, using some existing tools including Youtube and Amazon’s Cloud, but the software and the game experience is all of our original creation,” said Bushnell. “As well as the public shows – which run every Thursday on a variety of themes – we’re running private shows for teambuilding, birthdays and conferences.”
Two Bit Circus has also created Remote White Label so the software can be used and customised by others, and recently signed its largest white label customer, US family entertainment centre company Main Event.
The company is also scouting possible locations for more micro amusement parks across the US.
“As we perfect the one in LA, the opportunity to move fast with our expansion will become very real,” he said. “Ultimately, I could see room for 100 Two Bit Circus micro amusement parks in the US and 200 in Asia.
“This is a tragic moment for the locations based entertainment industry, but for those that survive there will be unbelievable opportunities on the other side.”
Read more from this issue of Attractions Management magazine
View contents of Attractions Management 2021 issue 1
Editor's letter: Doing better
The Black Lives Matter movement has challenged museums professionals to ask testing questions about their role in reparative history and the way we display and interpret racist and colonial collections
People: Brent Bushnell
Two Bit Circus has pivoted to an innovative online model aimed at keeping its community in touch
People: Michel Linet-Frion
After decades creating for Disney, Grévin and Center Parcs, Linet-Frion has launched his own consultancy
People: Anthony Rawlins
The Digital Visitor CEO explains a new whitepaper on how attractions can survive 2021 and beyond
Interview: Sarah Roots
Warner Bros’ Sarah Roots shares exciting details of the second Harry Potter Studio Tour, set to open in Japan in 2023
Inspired: Alone with Vermeer
The Mauritshuis in The Hague has allowed visitors one-to-one time with Vermeer’s <i>View of Delft</i>, ‘the most beautiful painting in the world’
Aquariums: Into the deep
Merlin and the Sea Life Trust share the highs and lows of the epic journey to get two whales to their new home in the world’s first beluga whale sanctuary in Iceland
Innovation: Sea change
Edge Innovations’ incredibly
life-like robot dolphins could spell the end of marine mammals in aquariums, says CEO Walt Conti
Interview: Bob Rogers
As BRC Imagination Arts celebrates 40 years in business, its founder celebrates his team’s achievements
Sponsored: Technically Creative
With clients including the Xplore
Family Entertainment Centre in Athens,
Technically Creative provides a one
stop, in-house solution to create
memorable and magical experiences.
We talk to CEO, Marc Broadbent
Sponsored: Fun Spot: Providing turnkey solutions
Industry innovator, Fun Spot, is on a roll, with a new EMEA
office and a range of innovative new products to help operators
deliver excellence to the family fun market. We find out more
Interview: Phil Hettema
The Hettema Group president on weathering the pandemic and creating powerful experiences
OMA has completed a major transformation of New York's New Museum, creating a larger
cultural campus that combines expanded exhibition spaces with learning, performance,
hospitality and public programming.
A US$50 million (£44.2 million, €51.2 million) transformation of Chicago's historic McCormick
Mansion has created a new destination that combines live magic, immersive theatre, dining and
private membership under one roof.
The Montana Historical Society has officially celebrated the opening of its new Montana
Heritage
Center, a US$107 million (£79 million, €92 million) destination that combines immersive
storytelling with cutting-edge audiovisual technology to bring the sta
San Antonio Zoo has reported a US$283 million economic impact for 2025, following a decade-
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attraction.
Plans for the AU$180 million redevelopment of Reef HQ Aquarium in Townsville, Australia, are
progressing, with the project set to transform the attraction into a global centre for reef
education and conservation.
Abu Dhabi-based investment firm Mubadala Capital has made a binding, fully financed
€1 billion
offer to acquire Pierre and Vacances SA, the European holiday resort operator behind the
continental European Center Parcs business.
Disney has reaffirmed its commitment to investing US$30 billion in its US parks and cruise
business by 2033, using new America250 celebrations to underline the role its attractions play
in supporting jobs, tourism and economic growth.
Expo 2030 Riyadh is being planned as a permanent visitor destination, with organisers
confirming the six-million-square-metre site will become a Global Village after the event closes.
The owner of one of Australia's best-known waterparks has acquired a major competitor,
creating a new attractions business spanning two of the country's largest visitor destinations.
The Toverland theme park in the Netherlands has announced a €98m expansion programme
that will add a resort, new attractions and staff facilities as it pursues plans to become a multi-
day destination.
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