Adventurer's Club from Walt Disney World recreated in painstaking detail with Half-Life engine

Walt Disney World's Adventurer's Club was a nightclub in the now-shuttered Pleasure Island area, where live players and animatronic trophies voiced by actors behind the scenes (who monitored the action with hidden cameras). It was one of my absolute favorite places at the park, and it shut along with the otherwise lacklustre Pleasure Island in 2008.

Many Club fans have mourned its passing, but Brerben, didn't just mourn, he re-created the Club in astonishing detail using the Half-Life engine and the Garry's Mod tool. From the Inside the Magic blog:

Throughout the time spent working on it, Brerben kept his focus on including as much detail as possible while encountering a few technical hurdles. He told me, "The interactive parts of the map were the most difficult to do, because, for example, I would search YouTube for segments where Babylonia would say something, and try to record the audio to put in my map, but I really couldn't do it correctly because there was always some guest in the video laughing hysterically which made it difficult to separate Babylonia's voice from the guest's laughter."

But while you can't sit through any complete Adventurers Club shows in the virtual world, there is still plenty of entertainment to be found. Brerben explained there are audio clips of "small sentences that the characters would say sometimes, such as Arnie and Claude in the Mask Room, the Colonel, and Babylonia." In addition, certain props and elements are interactive. "Some things, like the piano in the Library, will start playing if you walk up to it and activate it. Also in the Library are secret books scattered throughout the shelves, which do different things to the Library when you activate them."

..."I really have to give thanks to a YouTube user named Yodatc who sent me 3 gigabytes worth of photos and audio recordings that he took at the Club before it closed. Every single artifact, every single picture on the wall at the Club was accounted for in his high resolution photos."

Walt Disney World's Adventurers Club virtually recreated for fans to once again explore

Download the map

(Thanks, Ricky!)

• [Sef]

  TDM anyone?

• [absatz]

  This can be my first visit to Disneyland.

• [Malic]

  Fantastic job the Adventurer’s Club! I hope this inspires others!

  It would be great to see more of Old Disneyworld this way – Tomorrowland got such a overhaul (it had to – the future isn’t what it use to be…) but it was such a time capsule.

  The effort would be of Manhattan Project proportions but having virtual walk thoughs of such great detail of Disneyworld in the 1970′s would be fantastic.

• [Ellavemia]

  I wish someone could recreate 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. of course I think it is actually better in my memory than it ever was in reality.

• [Anonymous]

  Sorry to be a pedant, but technically it’s called the Source engine.

• [dequeued]

  BTW, there are some interesting things that can be recreated with Half Life 2.

  Check out the falling water house frank lloyd write
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tqsk4WARk2I

• [CyricPL]

  Pleasure Island is still open as of May of 2009, it’s just that almost all of the bars/clubs have been closed, and have been/are going to be replaced with more restaurants and stores.

• [Anonymous]

  I did a bit of Disneyland recreation myself:
  http://angryjim.com/fritokid

• [Gainclone]

  The music makes it feel more like Bioshock and less like Half Life 2

• [Geoff]

  This map is amazing. You can get into the pyramid nearby too, but keep an eye out for traps!

• [KnittinKttn]

  A new campaign has begun to try and save the Adventurers Club from permanent destruction.

  Apparently our hope lies in the new Chairman of Walt Disney Parks and Resorts, Tom Staggs. Here is a recent post at WDWMagic…
  ———–
  Master Gracey June 25th 2010, 03:25
  OK, so I’ve recently heard one of the best chances of getting our Club back reside in the new Chairman Walt Disney Parks & Resorts, Tom Staggs. The story I was told that gives me hope for this man goes like this:

  During one of his first days in his new position, Tom walked into Imagineering and asked them to tell him about the new Fantasyland Expansion. They were most emphatically telling him about the Ariel Dark Ride, Beauty and the Beast Restaurant, all the Princess Meet and Greets and Pixie Hollow, when he cut them off and said, “No”! He went on to tell Imagineering that not in his parks would he allow the possibility of a five year old boy, waiting in a three hour line for an autograph of Cinderella, just because his sister wants one! He then asked what was broken ground on so far and was told that Ariel’s Dark Ride and the Beauty and the Beast Restaurant. He said to finish those, but everything else, scrap and start again!

  I believe if a gutsy man like this is in charge of Parks and Resorts he can correct one of Jay Rasulo’s biggest mistakes (A.K.A. The closing of the Adventurers Club and all of Pleasure Island) if he is shown that the public still wants our nighttime escape returned. So please, those who wrote so many letters two years ago, (and anyone else who demands the greatest example of true Disney Imagineering to be brought back) once again take pen to paper (or any equivalent there of) and write to:

  Thomas O. Staggs
  Chairman
  Walt Disney Parks & Resorts
  C/O Team Disney Building
  500 South Buena Vista St.
  Burbank, CA 91521-4873

  [e-mail]

  The Club may have been gutted, but from what I’ve heard, nothing has been sent to Mystic Point yet, and the artifacts still reside in a warehouse on Walt Disney World property! It still can and should be put back! Let Tom Staggs know that Adventure is out there, we just want it back to 5189 Hill Street!
  ————–

  I would encourage anyone who has ever been to the Adventurers Club to please join in this last effort to save something that so many people hold close to their hearts.

• [calvert4096]

  Wow… downloading this right frickin now.

• [imag]

  Wow – that’s seriously impressive.

  This is one of the simple glories of the Internet. Many people can see things that creators spent a huge amount of time creating – and that means creators invest even more time in their creations.

  Anyway, nice work, guy who made this. It’s a great labor of love. It would be cool if it could be released so people could keep adding to and improving it…

• [Anonymous]

  DEATHMATCH PLZ

• [DisneyBoy]

  The Adventurers Club (no apostrophe) is the pinnacle of Imagineering.

  An extremely detailed environment with a rich backstory where actors and animatronics interact with the guests for hours in a way that has never been seen or experienced before, or since.

  I have yet to meet one person who has been there and hasn’t fallen in love with the place.

  I give Disney a lot of leeway, but closing down this club is among one of the biggest mistakes they have ever done.

  It may have not been the most profitable locale within Disney World (it did make a profit, just not a big profit) but then I bet the same could be said about the Dapper Dans or the barber shop at the Magic Kingdom. Sometimes it is about guest experience. Give the guests an amazing experience, something to remember and smile, and they will return and once again pay for an expensive room and $10 hamburgers.

• [Anonymous]

  This is absolutely astounding. I am thoroughly impressed and appreciate the time and detail that went into this. I never had the chance to experience Disney World as I live in Canada and Disney Land is much more accessible to me. But I am an avid Disney fan and I thank you very much for letting me experience this when I never could have otherwise.

• [Anonymous]

  This is stunning….a hell of a lot of work has gone into this and it shows, BRAVO !

• [Anonymous]

  Hell yeah I can’t wait to play this on deathmatch good call.

  BTW this looks so awesome, GREAT JOB I can’t believe this, I thought this club was a rumor.

  Do you have anything else planned like this?
  how long did it take?

• [lewis stoole]

  you know about club 33, right?

  • [Jessicka Sinz]

    Lol, it’ suppose to be a secret club or whatever, but everyone seems to know about it! According from resources, it’s somewhere in the New orleans area in Disneyland, but in the words of the “Reading Rainbow” guy, “Don’t take my word for it…”

• [Anonymous]

  Kungaloosh! Long live the Adventurers Club.

• [kmoser]

  Every single artifact, every single picture on the wall at the Club was accounted for in his high resolution photos.

  Perhaps we should be recording and saving high-resolution audio and video of current Disney (and other) artifacts, so when they’re gone they can be recreated online.

• [Stefan Jones]

  @Lewis: Cory has posted about it in the past.

  * * *

  I went to Disneyworld nearly 20 years ago, and I still remember my visits to The Adventurers’ Club quite well. The little skits were lots of fun, and the actors took the invasion of SF fans (a worldcon was in town) with equanimity.

  • [lewis stoole]

    why am i always the last to hear about it?