Resorts World Las Vegas: Event Spaces

The nightlife hub of Resorts World Las Vegas is made up of four venues; Zouk Nightclub, the resort’s state-of-the-art nightclub; Ayu Dayclub, a dayclub that includes the pools and cabanas; Redtail, a social gaming bar and dining experience; and finally Fuhu, offering experiential dining with a modern Asian flair. 

THE VISION

While each of these spaces have the ability to function independently of one another, they also needed to integrate for special events. For example, Fuhu’s wall of sliding glass doors connect directly into Ayu Dayclub, which allows both spaces to tie into each other. Similarly, Zouk Nightclub and Ayu Dayclub can merge to act as a single combined space for large concerts. On the other side of the spectrum, there’s still a need for individuals to have granular control over such elements as volume and input source controls — for example within Ayu Dayclub’s cabanas and bungalows, or Fuhu’s private dining rooms, or Redtail’s private karaoke rooms. Finally, despite the fluidity of the system, the Resorts World Las Vegas team still needed a system intuitive enough to facilitate the success of in-house personnel.

DEVELOPING A NIMBLE SYSTEM

Resorts World Las Vegas partnered with Solotech to design and implement this lofty vision. Q-SYS enabled Solotech to develop an overarching system that allowed for specific areas to operate independently of the main source system, while also still being able to immediately revert back into the main system if required. This provided a huge amount of customisation capability to support client needs. Ben Baczenas, Integration System Designer of Solotech explains, “With Q-SYS we have the ability to dictate very specifically within one distributed system to address client requirements, while another system is doing something completely different. Room combiners and all of the great functionality within Q-SYS gives each of these spaces the potential to be incredibly transformative.”

The Resorts World Las Vegas team required a software-based solution that could simultaneously enable their entertainment spaces to function alone, to combine and also to allow for niche independent control in different configurations depending on the event. Because of its diverse network architecture, the Resorts World Las Vegas team required an inclusive solution that facilitated the integration of multiple third-party devices. With a wide array of end users, stakeholders needed a solution that offered not only depth but was also accessible to those without an engineering background.

ROUTING ACROSS DIFFERENT DEVICES

All four of these venues communicate across a diverse network of different devices within Q-SYS OS. The openness of Q-SYS to third-party devices enabled Resorts World Las Vegas to leverage Q-SYS as the heart of the routing capabilities built into each of the spaces, and to handle most of the heavy lifting. “Q-SYS has become this centralised hub because it is much more flexible to build considering the varied status of our integrations,” describes Baczenas. “It makes a whole lot more sense and feels much more like a distributed audio router than it does a mixing console. Q-SYS also gives us that ability to-go. For example, when the venue scheduled a festival style weekend, programming could be implemented that maintained everyday operations while allowing for seamless integration of touring systems. That’s much simpler to automate in Q-SYS, whereas we’d have to bypass distributed house systems, or constantly have house staff re-patching things on the fly. It would never have functioned smoothly without Q-SYS.”

FACILITATING IN-HOUSE SUCCESS

The entire system was structured with an end-user ideology, asking questions around who is using the space and how, as well a striking a balance between functionality and simplicity. Users did not just include audio engineers, lighting engineers, or staff, but also the artists themselves. Because new and interesting uses of the spaces are continually being discovered, the design is likewise a constantly evolving process, one that Q-SYS facilitates though continual firmware upgrades. “With the robust yet simplified design that Q-SYS provides, it makes everything much more attainable for an end user, especially if they aren’t coming in with a deep engineering background. This also allows us to easily continue to build upon what has already been created,” adds Baczenas.

AN OPEN DOOR TO THE FUTURE

The entire Resorts World Las Vegas process was one of collaboration, with multiple different parties coming together to develop something truly special via communication and collaboration. In this way, the internal life of the system very much mirrors the process of its designers — a diverse network of devices seamlessly communicating to create unforgettable experiences, with Q-SYS at its centre. Baczenas concludes “Q-SYS is incredibly inclusive of their third-party partners, so the diversity you can build in is by far one of the nicest things I’ve ever had with any product. It doesn’t feel like at any point Q-SYS closes the door on anyone.”