Bringing the World
to Boston
We're at FIFA World Cup 2026 Fan Festival - with a connective activation built for 5000 visitors a day.
June 12–27, 2026
The Challenge:
High Traffic meets High Engagement
- ▸ With up to 5,000 daily visitors across 16 days, the activation had to handle high traffic while still having some depth. This meant no queue, no game-over, no wrong way to play.
- ▸ Placed in the festival playground, it needed to be easy and accessible for both kids and adults, encouraging strangers to play together.
- ▸ The design had to reflect the World Cup's global energy while feeling locally rooted.
Family-Friendly
Kids and adults play alongside each other. No wrong way to engage — 5 seconds is as valid as 5 minutes.
Connective by Design
The portal can't be activated alone. The design encourages collaboration — and turn strangers into teammates.
Globally Relevant
Environments feature skylines from competing nations and Boston easter eggs, making it globally connected yet locally personal.
High Throughput
No queue management, no bottlenecks — people drift in and out naturally at peak times.
The Activation
Step in and see yourself placed inside richly rendered environments — skylines from the nations competing in Boston, with hidden local landmarks scattered throughout as easter eggs.
Keep the ball in the air to make a portal appear. When it crosses through, the world changes. Activating it solo is very difficult — and way less fun. It takes teamwork, which is the whole point.
There's no beginning, middle, or end. People drift in, play, and drift out naturally. No waiting required.
The Execution
We executed this end-to-end. On a tight timeline and tighter fabrication budget, we worked with a local partner — handling signage, engineering, hardware, and UX/UI largely in-house. Our team staffed the activation for the full 16-day run at City Hall Plaza.
UX/UI & Interactive
Body tracking, portal mechanics, and environment design — built in-house.
Hardware & Fabrication
Signage, engineering, and physical buildout with a local partner.
Staffed for 16 Days
Our team ran the activation floor daily for the full festival run.
See it in Action
The recap, straight from City Hall Plaza.
Overheard on-site
Unscripted moments from the festival.
I want a whole wall of this!
Isn't this one awesome, Mom?
I could watch this all day.
Watched fans supporting opposing teams become friends mid-game — strangers pulled together by design.
Got grown adults laughing together. Consistently, across all 15 operating days.
By the Numbers
15 operating days. 1 weather closure. 0 technical outages.
Once the portal appeared, players hit it nearly every time.
June 27 — the final day — was the single highest-engagement day of the run.
Each world change required a group to keep the ball in the air long enough to open a portal, then collectively direct it through. That's 6,385 moments of shared, unscripted achievement.
Engagement was densest between 3pm and 6pm across the full run, aligning with post-match festival foot traffic. The activation held attention during the busiest windows of the day.