Ministry of Tourism, Saudi Arabia
World Tourism Day, held virtually.
A browser-based metaverse for the Kingdom’s World Tourism Day: a digital twin of Bujairi Terrace, a gallery of Saudi artists, live consultants and in-world commerce.
Government · Riyadh, KSA · Digital Experiences
- Client
- Ministry of Tourism, Saudi Arabia
- Partners
- STC, Mindflares
- Product
- Browser-based 3D metaverse experience
- Event
- World Tourism Day
- Platforms
- Mobile, tablet and desktop, in the browser
The client
Branch and its partners built a 3D world that runs in a browser on a phone, a tablet or a desktop, with low-latency rendering and 3D spatial audio rather than a download and a headset. It opens at a reception hub and branches into three places: a marketplace that is a digital twin of Bujairi Terrace, a gallery of Saudi artists, and a networking floor where visitors meet the Ministry’s consultants and each other.
The Ministry of Tourism leads Saudi Arabia’s tourism sector and the investment case it makes to the rest of the world, from the Kingdom’s cultural heritage to its sustainable travel programme.
The challenge
World Tourism Day asks a destination to show its investment offer to a global audience, and the usual way to do that is to fly that audience in. The Ministry wanted the opposite: a low-carbon venue that could argue for Saudi Arabia as a hub for green tourism without contradicting itself, hold heritage and modern design in the same room, and still do the work a pavilion does. Real consultations, real bookings, real transactions.
What we built
Multi-device web platform
One build for mobile, tablet and desktop, delivered in the browser: low-latency 3D rendering, 4K streaming, and 3D spatial audio that puts a performance or a conversation where it is actually standing.
Registration and onboarding
A custom registration module with transactional email updates, and multilingual greeting hosts who meet a visitor on arrival rather than leaving them alone in a lobby.
Reception hub
Information desks that connect a visitor to a live investment consultant, interactive maps, e-Visa applications, and avatar fashion designed by Mohammed Khoja in partnership with Nuqtah.
Digital twin marketplace
A 3D replica of Bujairi Terrace and its Michelin-starred restaurants, Hakkasan, Tatel and Takya: menus to download, tables booked live, and worldwide shipping and payment behind the retail.
Cultural art gallery
Work by local Saudi artists, with piano and traditional oud performances carried in spatial audio, and a voting mechanic that lets visitors pick the pieces leading the room.
Business networking
Voice chat pods, one-to-one text and voice calls, interactive info pods, and social gestures, clapping, waving and agreement, which are the small signals a room needs to feel occupied.
Inside the build
Results
A benchmark for virtual green tourism: an international audience reached for World Tourism Day with no flights behind the attendance.
Cultural exposure carried to that audience by Saudi artists, musicians and designers rather than by a brochure.
Investment consultations and e-commerce transactions conducted in-world, so the venue closed business rather than only advertising it.
Integrations
- PayTabs
- Shopify
- Mada
- STC Pay
- DHL
More work
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