Collaborating with AWS, Verizon said it was the first demonstration of a 5G and mobile edge compute (MEC)-enabled mobile game. Fans with the NFL Ticketholder app were sent a push notification during the second quarter allowing them to compete by using their smartphone to virtually toss a football into the back of a virtual pickup truck positioned in the middle of the field.
Fans that were connected to 5G Ultra Wideband in the stands could point their phone’s camera to the middle of the field to see the virtual pickup truck materialise on the field using augmented reality (AR). The interactive AR experience also allowed fans to simultaneously see the live virtual football tosses happening in real-time from other fans.
“Gaming is all about community and so is the Super Bowl and together with AWS we were able to bring these two communities together to offer a first of its kind 5G and MEC-enabled gaming experience to fans at scale,” said Nicki Palmer (pictured), chief product officer at Verizon.
“The super-fast speeds, massive bandwidth and low latency provided by 5G and MEC lets players have a console-quality multi-player gaming experience on the go and allows developers to rewrite the rules for creating eye-popping, graphics-rich multiplayer action. The future of gaming is happening right now.”
With Verizon 5G Edge and AWS Wavelength, the gameplay was offloaded to the edge of Verizon’s 5G network reducing latency and allowing for a massive multi-player experience in stadium.
Verizon customers playing the game in-stadium had an enhanced gaming experience thanks to the super low latency and massive bandwidth provided by 5G Ultra Wideband and mobile edge compute.
