Gamification and Immersive Experiences in Museums as Audience Development Strategy

Technology has always been playing a significant role in interpretation and presentation of cultural heritage, both the objects exhibited in museums and heritage present in situ. Enhancement in the field of extended reality can be seen as the gamechanger for the heritage presentation, with the immersiveness and gamification having the potential of turning nonvisitors into visitors. Cultural institutions, city governments, tourist offices and heritage sites are turning towards the concepts of immersive and gamified heritage, trying to reach new segments of visitors and tourists. The paper brings an extensive contemporary literature review on the immersive technologies in museums and heritage sites, and audience development trends in museums in general. The paper deals with the research problem of immersive technologies as audience development strategies of Croatian museums. The research questions are the following: Is the general population interested in current museums' offerings? Will the interest for the museums' offerings rise if they would offer an immersive and gamified experience? The research has been conducted on the general population as cultural audiences, exploring their attitudes towards museums, video games, immersive realities, and use of gamification and immersiveness in museum offerings.