Quest To LEGOLAND
- Brand
- LEGOLAND
- Year
- 2017
- Objective
- Engagement
- Industry
- Entertainment
- Mechanic
- Adventure & Quest
- Platform
- App
- Agency
- VML
Objective
LEGOLAND Florida Resort wanted the vacation to start before the family even reached the gate, turning the long car ride — usually the worst part of a theme-park trip — into part of the experience itself. The app launched to coincide with Spring Break, when families were already on the road to the park. A secondary goal was educational: give road trips back their old purpose as a chance to learn about the places you're passing, rather than another excuse to hand kids a screen.
Solution
A parent installs the free app, enters the family's starting point and travel date, and the app plots the real driving route to LEGOLAND. The child then picks one of four minifigure themes — Pirate, Kingdom, Adventure, Beach — and a character like Captain Brickbeard sets off across a live map that tracks the car's actual GPS position. As the family drives past real landmarks — national parks, historic sites, mountains, caves, towns — those places surface on screen with trivia, quizzes, and themed mini-games built around the story. A countdown keeps track of how much longer until the park, and if the signal drops, the game switches to an offline mode and catches up once it's back.
Results
In the four months after launch, 912 families used the app, generating 36,385 landmark milestones, 23,296 pieces of trivia read, 9,866 quizzes taken, and 1,422 games played, totaling 785 hours of in-app time during drives to the park.
- 1
A parent downloads the free app and confirms consent by email before the game unlocks for the child; the app states upfront that it collects no personal data and does not use location for marketing.
- 2
The player enters the family's starting point and travel date, and the app plots the route to LEGOLAND and pulls roughly 60 points of interest along that specific path, each pre-linked to a fact, quiz, or themed game.
- 3
The child picks a minifigure theme — Pirate, Kingdom, Adventure, or Beach — and that character becomes the traveling companion shown on the route.
- 4
The app activates on its own once the car starts moving, with no tap required, and tracks the figure's progress by GPS along the real route rendered as a game map in place of turn-by-turn navigation.
- 5
As the car passes a real landmark — a national park, historic site, natural landmark, body of water, cave, mountain, or city — it appears on screen with a linked fact or quiz question, drawn from a pool of more than 1,000 pieces of contextual trivia.
- 6
Reaching checkpoints unlocks story chapters and missions tied to the chosen theme (recovering lost ships, fixing magical mishaps, defeating a pharaoh, or fighting a kraken), which play out across 40 mini-games spanning battles, puzzles, and races.
- 7
Alongside the story, the player can dip into window-view car games tied to the passing scenery, while an onscreen counter tracks remaining time and distance as a game-map alternative to "are we there yet."
- 8
If cell signal drops, the app switches to an offline mode that advances events by elapsed time instead of GPS position.
- 9
Each trip plays out differently, since the landmarks, facts, and missions a session generates depend entirely on the route driven.
