Vicious Engine
Used to power a Hilton hotels training game.
MORRISVILLE, NC - April 14, 2009
Vicious Cycle Software announced today that Virtual Heroes, Inc. (VHI), “The Advanced Learning Technology Company,” is utilizing the Vicious Engine to power HGI Ultimate Team Play for PSP® (PlayStation®Portable) platform, the first interactive training game to be used in the hospitality industry. The training program, which launched across all Hilton Garden Inn hotels worldwide in February 2009, was demonstrated at the recent Game Developers Conference (GDC) in San Francisco by David Kervella, Senior Manager of Brand Education at Hilton Hotels Corporation. Kervella demonstrated the title and provided insight into the rollout of the game and the hardware across to their hotels.
“We chose Vicious Engine primarily for its straightforward platform conversion onto PSP,” said Jerry Heneghan, Virtual Heroes founder and CEO. “When combined with the engine’s full-featured technology and ability to render a highly detailed in-game environment, it was an easy choice for this project.”
“We are amazed with what Virtual Heroes is doing to create effective learning tools for the corporate world,” said Eric Peterson, president and CEO of Vicious Cycle Software. “Vicious Engine offers the power and flexibility necessary for rapidly prototyping a fully platform-compliant product, an ideal solution for Ultimate Team Play.”
The adaptable, easy-to-learn development engine has been used to design games of every style, including adventure/platformer games like Dead Head Fred and the best-selling Flushed Away, deeply addictive casual fare like Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords™ for Wii™ home videogame system, PlayStation®2 computer entertainment system, and PSP® (PlayStation®Portable) system, and even instructional/educational titles like Discover Babylon and INNOV8.
Vicious Cycle Software recently launched a new version of the company’s proven game engine called Vicious Engine 2 (Ve2). Ve2 offers a suite of new and improved features for the Xbox 360® video game and entertainment system from Microsoft and PLAYSTATION®3 computer entertainment system from Sony Computer Entertainment Inc, including an updated lighting engine, an animation blending component, and modern pixel shader technology, all optimized for current platforms. Vicious Cycle Software publicly showcased Ve2 for the first time during GDC.
More information about the Vicious Engine and Ve2 is available at www.viciousengine.com.
About Ultimate Team Play
Created especially for Hilton Garden Inn by Virtual Heroes Inc. (VHI), Ultimate Team Play puts team members in a virtual Hilton Garden Inn hotel and in various scenarios, including positions in housekeeping, food and beverage, engineering, maintenance, as well as front desk. Players will have to stop and decide what their best course of action will be to make sure they are able to fulfill a guest’s request and/or complete a specific job task within a limited time. Their immediate or non-immediate actions toward guests—since guest interaction will be the primary focus of the game—will directly affect the mood of the guest as well as the hotel’s Satisfaction and Loyalty Tracking (SALT) scores.
About Hilton Garden Inn
Hilton Garden Inn is the award-winning, mid-priced brand that continually strives to ensure today’s busy travelers have everything they need to be most productive on the road — from complimentary wired and Wi-Fi Internet access in all guestrooms and PrintSpots™ mobile printing to the hotel’s complimentary 24-hour business center to one of the most comfortable beds you will ever experience with the Garden Sleep System®. So whether on the road for personal or business reasons, Hilton Garden Inn offers the amenities and services for travelers to sleep deep, stay fit, eat well and work smart while away from home.
To find out more about Hilton Garden Inn locations throughout North America and Europe, visit www.hgi.com.
About Virtual Heroes Inc.
Founded in January 2004, and located in Research Triangle Park, NC, Virtual Heroes Inc. (VHI), the “Advanced Learning Technology Company," creates collaborative interactive learning solutions (serious games) and virtual worlds for the federal systems, healthcare and commercial markets.
Advanced Learning Technologies (ALT) leverage simulation learning and digital game-based learning paradigms to accelerate learning, increase proficiency and reduce costs. Virtual Worlds facilitate training, education, collaboration, telepresence, and R&D across distributed teams using internet 2.0 technologies.
As a global market leader in this field, VHI applications facilitate highly interactive, self-paced learning and instructor-led, distributed team training on the Virtual Heroes Advanced Learning Technology (A.L.T.) platform using the Unreal® Engine 3 by Epic Games. In 2007, VHI was honored by Military Training and Technology magazine as one of the industry's Top 100 companies for a third consecutive year. Clients include Intel, Hilton Hotels, Discovery Channel Canada, U.S. Department of Homeland Security, George Washington University Medical Center, Duke Medical Center, National Institutes of Health, U.S. Army Special Operations Command and the America’s Army game project. Products under development include HumanSim™ for training healthcare professionals and first responders. For more information, please visit www.virtualheroes.com.
About Vicious Cycle Software
Vicious Cycle Software, Inc. is a premier developer of interactive entertainment software based in Morrisville, NC. Founded in 2000, the company is dedicated to creating compelling content for all ages across all platforms, including Ben 10 ALIEN FORCE The Game for the PlayStation®2 computer entertainment system, PSP® (PlayStation®Portable) system, and Wii™; Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords® for the PlayStation 2 system, PSP system, and Wii; and PSP system exclusive and original title Dead Head Fred®, winner of the Writer’s Guild of America’s first inaugural Videogame Writing Award.
Vicious Cycle is also the developer and licensor of the Vicious Engine®, a comprehensive and fully portable middleware solution for game development on personal computers, consoles, and handheld systems. The recently announced Vicious Engine 2™ (Ve2) offers a suite of new and improved features for game development on the Xbox 360® video game and entertainment system from Microsoft and the PLAYSTATION®3 computer entertainment system.
For more information, please visit the company's web sites at www.viciouscycleinc.com and www.viciousengine.com. Vicious Cycle is a D3Publisher development studio.
PlayStation, PLAYSTATION and PSP are the registered trademarks of Sony Computer Entertainment Inc.
Kate Pietrelli, TriplePoint
415-955-8500
katep@triplepointpr.com