Design and Evaluation of Mixed Reality Application for Historical Sites Guide

Recent studies have shown that digital guiding has achieved positive outcomes through emerging technologies. Currently, most digital guides use virtual reality and augmented reality technologies, but there are still few applications of mixed reality for tour guides. With mixed reality connecting real space and virtual objects, users can directly manipulate the virtual content through gestures to enhance the realism and immersive experience. This study implemented a mixed-reality digital guide system for historical sites and cultural relics to discuss the differences in learning effectiveness and immersive experience between the mixed-reality digital guide mode and the traditional paper-based guide mode. The results show that (1) the mixed-reality digital guide mode is significantly better than the traditional paper-based guide mode in learning about historical sites; (2) the mixed-reality digital guide mode is significantly better than the traditional paper-based guide mode in the immersive experience of the historical sites guide. Moreover, the results verify that the mixed reality digital guide mode is more effective than the traditional paper-based guide mode in enhancing the immersive experience of the learners and thus improving learning effectiveness.