Humankind has been using animated characters to tell stories for more than a century. But these film and game characters which many of us come to love dearly from a young age – have not been able to cross over to our physical world. Is there a way to make animated characters justice in a physical embodiment?
The Creative Design Department at Bandai Namco has together with Furhat embodied one of their most popular virtual characters “to life”, creating a physical, interactive robot version of the character “Mirai Komachi”. Using a specifically designed mask, voice, gestures and a wig, all provided from the creative team at Bandai Namco, the Mirai character interacts with users in Japanese and has different behaviours programmed for her to react to peoples movement in her immediate environment. The result indeed has turned out much better than we could have imagined.
After the initial successful project with the Mirai robot, which have been featured in several events and shows, Bandai Namco is now looking at using the robot as a greeter and attraction in several of their amusement parks across Asia.
