“Empire Retold” is an exploratory, story-driven, Augmented Reality (AR) experience that explores fictional audio narratives inspired by an all-but-forgotten historical event that took place in Bellahouston Park, Glasgow.

Three narratives each provide a different understanding of Glasgow’s history. Players find geo-located nodes at meaningful locations where they discover audio storytelling and ‘capture’ AR visual content. Stories use archival data as well as material contributed by local people, using ethical, decolonisation practices that were embedded from the beginning of the project. Narrative content is enhanced with sound design that enhances the natural geographical soundscape as well as the narratives.

Each story takes 60 – 75 minutes.

Our design process drew on the theory of audio-led outdoor AR, and followed best-practice for anti-racism (given the complex, contested, polyvocal histories that are told). Audio design was collaborative between the sound designer and authors and aimed to enhance both the natural geographical soundscape as well as deliver new meanings.

Because the stories are firmly ‘place-based’ it must be understood that it is less meaningful when not used within Bellahouston Park, Glasgow. However, the app has a “Play Random’ mode that will function in any outdoor space and to help judging, here is a folder containing the isolated story files: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1Y9NhmD6KR0aggDHnixHvpFLC3XXuKaao?usp=sharing