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A new Olde Kensington attraction is giving Philadelphians a chance to step inside a video game.
Anthony Nardone recently opened Gateways Cinescape, an immersive gaming experience that he hopes will bring people together through play. Drawing on knowledge from two companies known for engineering and entertainment — SpaceX and Disney — his new endeavor combines his technical and creative sides.
It took three years to develop the games, build the hardware and decorate the space, but now Nardone is ready to invite the community in.
“Experiences like this inspired me when I was a kid,” he said. “Now I’m creating something on the local level.”
The space features four 15-minute games, each with digital and physical gaming features. In all the games, players have to work together to complete a challenge, like filling cups with cooking ingredients, searching for pirates’ gold or hunting for ghosts.
“It’s a magic movie theater where every theater that you enter is a cinematic world that you compete in,” Nardone said. “They’re all inspired by different video games, things that I really enjoyed as a kid.”
Only a month into operations, he’s already considering how to get involved with the community. Local neighborhood associations helped him secure zoning permits, and Nardone wants to give back by offering Gateways as a place for people to gather.
The space also wants to get involved with Philly’s gaming community and be known for throwing tournaments or league nights.
Nardone also wants to invite local students to learn more about game design, he said, building on his own childhood inspirations.
“Kids can enjoy the games, and then [I can say] here’s how an entrepreneur does it, and here’s how you build it, and here’s how you design it,” he said.
Fulfilling a passion for game design
Disney’s Haunted Mansion ride first inspired Nardone’s passion for building immersive experiences. He enjoyed the idea of creating something that transports riders to a different world and his long-term dream has always been to open a theme park, he said.
Nardone studied mechanical engineering and integrated product design at the University of Pennsylvania and landed roles at Disney that helped him realize that goal. He completed two internships, where he learned about ride engineering and animatronics.
“At that point, I felt like I’d already achieved the dream, so I was like, ‘What do I do now?’” he said.
After school, he went to work for SpaceX as an engineer, but couldn’t shake his desire to build immersive games.
On the side, he built a few games and set them up at different venues around Los Angeles, where he was living at the time. He realized that people enjoyed what he was creating and that they were willing to pay for the experiences.
“[The dream] turned into: I want to start my own business,” Nardone said.
He decided to leave his full-time job and move back to Philly. With financial support from the city’s Neighborhood Funding Stream Business Assistance Grant program, he started what later became Gateways Cinescape.
Building experiences from scratch
When designing games, Nardone usually starts with a story or theme he wants to explore and gameplay concepts he thinks would translate well into real life, he said. He then tries to match them up for the most compelling experience.
Nardone leans on a small team — his software partner Kevin Thomas and his parents — to help develop the games, test the hardware and electronics, and design the decor and props.
The space’s software infrastructure allows Nardone to adjust the games as he goes, taking in feedback from visitors and also pulling from his own ideas, he said.
Eventually, Nardone said he wants to integrate features that make the games interactive between the players and the people waiting in the lounge area. Maybe by projecting what’s happening in each room on a big screen in the lounge or adding mini games to the bar area for people waiting, he added.
“All the games have so much untapped depth that I want to tap into,” he said. “I hope people, when they leave the games, they think to themselves, that was a great experience.”
In addition to personal ties to the region, Nardone is building Gateways in Philly to fill a gap in the market. Philly is seeing more immersive attractions, like Ministry of Awe or Beat the Bomb, but many of them are national chains, while Gateways is Philly-specific, he said.
“Market opportunity meets the general question of, why not Philly,” he said. “Why wouldn’t Philly want to embrace something like this?”
