Inside the Shougang Park in Shijingshan District, there is a sci-fi theme park. On the first day of the Chinese New Year, February 10th, the SoReal Sci-Fi Park located in the Shougang Blast Furnace No. 1 will officially open to the public. Visitors are invited to explore the "Beijing Star Harbor" spaceship base, the "Qi Tian Hao" space battleship, play a "Journey to the West" VR game, have a cup of coffee at Core Coffee Shop, experience interstellar travel, and spend a sci-fi-filled Spring Festival holiday.
Blast Furnace No. 1 is located in the north of the Shougang Park's Jin'an Sci-Fi Square, separated from the earliest opened Blast Furnace No. 3 by Qunminghu Street. Whether driving or walking by, visitors will be attracted by this blast furnace that combines industrial style, the metaverse, and art. This blast furnace, a meritorious one for Shougang, was first built in September 1919 and was rebuilt in 1938. On November 20th of the same year, the blast furnace began production, marking the first time that Shougang produced molten iron. Later, in 1993, Blast Furnace No. 1 was relocated to its current location for expansion and transformation, increasing its effective volume from 576 cubic meters to 2536 cubic meters. It was later shut down due to Shougang's relocation and adjustment.
After nearly five years of renovation, the brand new Blast Furnace No. 1 is now in front of people. The "Super Space" sign hanging high on the blast furnace reveals that it has become an industrial-style sci-fi park. The music constantly playing in front of the south square is both dynamic and mysterious, arousing everyone's curiosity and desire to explore.
The SoReal Metaverse Park embodies people's imagination of the universe, sci-fi world, and future space. The renovated Blast Furnace No. 1 has truly turned these wild imaginations into a tangible reality park. Walking along the waterfall-shaped stairs into the park, visitors arrive at a secret spaceship launch base called "Beijing Star Harbor," which is connected to the "Qi Tian Hao" space battleship, the outpost of space exploration. Visitors departing from here will transform into "Star Chasers," boarding the spaceship to explore the vast universe and complete their missions.
For people living in the real world, the space battleship is a whole new future world, with a large spaceship display screen, mysterious ecological jungle, and more, all of which are fascinating and interesting. Every few steps, visitors will encounter different game experience projects, such as VR roller coasters, VR horse riding, VR shooting, etc. Along the way, they will also meet different "NPC" actors, inviting everyone to participate in rich interactive experiences.
The most interesting of them all is undoubtedly the VR human-machine battle game "The Origin Battle of Journey to the West". Wearing VR glasses, visitors become game characters, following the Monkey King to ride on clouds and mist, passing through the Water Curtain Cave, and entering the Dragon Palace. They complete the journey of slaying demons and monsters through various levels. After experiencing the game, even after taking off the VR glasses, the immersive feeling of the game lingers on.
If visitors get tired of playing the game, they can enter the three-story Core Coffee Shop to have a cup of coffee and relax. This Core Coffee Shop is not just an ordinary coffee shop. It is located at the core of the entire blast furnace. By hollowing out the past iron-making core and retaining its industrial style, it has been transformed into an "energy refueling station" for the amusement park.
"The last time I entered the core was more than 20 years ago. At that time, we wore heat-insulating suits and climbed in from the hot air outlet with shovels and pickaxes, digging out the slag one by one. The ground was covered with red-hot coke, the room temperature was over 40 degrees Celsius, and it was dirty and tiring," said Song Jinglin, a former blast furnace manager who had been responsible for ironmaking production at Shougang for more than 30 years. "I have never thought about being able to sit in the core and drink coffee. Over the years, technology has advanced rapidly, and the changes in blast furnaces have been significant. It is fortunate that these blast furnaces have been preserved and transformed into new spaces, allowing people to continue to enter, touch, and experience them."
