An interactive shooting simulator is a system that uses tracking cameras and laser-fitted or replica firearms to score your shots against a projected scenario, with no live ammunition involved at any point. We run one in Riga, and it sits five minutes from Old Town inside a real Cold War bunker. The software is SimWay, built in Stockholm and installed in more than 2,600 locations worldwide. No firearms licence. No age minimum. No prior experience assumed.
TL;DR: A SimWay session a.lv runs 30 minutes as standard and costs €20, whether one or two people shoot it, so a pair pays €10 each. Longer sessions can be arranged when you book. Two programmes run on it: HUNT PRO (hunting and wildlife, 14 game modules, 1–2 players) and PRACTICAL (solo IPSC-style drills, 50+ courses). No licence, no age restriction, and bookable online for a €2 reservation fee.
What Is an Interactive Shooting Simulator?
An interactive shooting simulator replaces live ammunition with laser and camera tracking, so the weapon in your hands behaves like a firearm while the hit registers digitally on a projected target. The gun is either a purpose-built replica or a real firearm fitted with a laser cartridge and a tracking device. A camera watches the barrel. The software works out where the round would have gone, and the scenario on screen reacts before your sights have settled.
An interactive shooting simulator scores the physical act of aiming a weapon, so grip, stance, breathing, and trigger discipline all change your result the same way they would on a live lane. Slouch and it shows. An arcade light gun only ever knew where you pointed it. This one has been watching your muzzle for the whole second before the shot.
The system we use is built by SimWay AB, a Stockholm developer making hunting and shooting software since 2006. We call it "the world's leading digital shooting training system" on its own service page, and the company reports over 2,600 installations globally. Forget the number for a second. This is training hardware that hunters and competition shooters pay for, and you can book it for an afternoon.
How Does GunRange.lv Interactive Shooting Simulator Work?
Our interactive shooting simulator works in four steps: you choose a programme, you choose a weapon, the tracking camera calibrates to your setup, and then you shoot at a projected scenario that scores every shot as you take it. All the bang. None of the brass.
Calibration takes seconds and the instructor handles it. From there the room does the work: a projected scenario, a tracked barrel, and a score that updates before you have lowered the gun. What you are holding while that happens is worth a section of its own.
What the camera captures goes well beyond hit or miss. SimWay's barrel motion analysis tracks where your muzzle was travelling before the shot broke and where it went afterwards. You can watch your own flinch. Nobody enjoys that replay. It is also the fastest marksmanship correction most first-timers will ever get.
What Weapons Do You Shoot on the Simulator?
We the simulator arsenal as real weapons fitted with a laser system alongside high-quality replicas, and in practice that means three options: SimWay's own system weapons, your own firearm fitted with a tracking device and a laser cartridge, or a real GLOCK-17/19 with a reload magazine on PRACTICAL. None of them chambers a live round. What changes between them is the weight in your hands and how hard the thing kicks back.
- SimWay system weapons: the platform's own replica firearms, already calibrated to the cameras and ready to shoot with no setup from you. SimWay builds its practical replica with working recoil and a bullet and reload counter, so a magazine change costs you time the way it would in a real stage.
- Your own weapon: offered on HUNT PRO, fitted with a tracking device and a specific laser bullet. Your trigger, your weight, no ammunition.
- A real GLOCK-17/19: offered on PRACTICAL with a reload magazine, laser-tracked rather than live-fired. This is as close as the simulator gets to the genuine article.
- SimWay Blowback pistol: listed as coming soon on our service page, not yet bookable.
Which replica ends up in your hands depends on the programme, because a clay-shooting module and a timed IPSC stage want very different guns. Ask at the point of booking if you have a preference.
What Is SimWay HUNT PRO?
HUNT PRO is SimWay's hunting simulator, built for 1 to 2 players, covering 14 game modules across roughly 40 scenarios. Its purpose as education, training, and entertainment, in that order, and the system genuinely does all three. Clay pigeons at one end, driven boar at the other. Think of it as the grown-up grandchild of the duck-hunting cartridge you blew into as a kid. This one measures your technique, and no cartoon dog pops up to laugh at you. Fourteen modules in total. The ones people ask for:
- Clay shooting: moving targets, timing, and lead
- Wild boar: the driven-boar scenario hunters train on
- Birds: fast, erratic, genuinely difficult
- Moose and deer: shot placement and ethical timing
- Practical shooting drills: speed and accuracy under a clock
- Sport shooting: structured target work
Boar is the one people underestimate. Each scenario is built around movement analysis and what SimWay calls a safe, ethical training process. Reading an animal's movement and deciding, in about a second, to hold your fire is a genuine skill. You only get one shot, they say. On this system you get forty, and you pay for none of them.
What Is SimWay PRACTICAL?
PRACTICAL is SimWay's competition module, built for practical shooting sport, better known by its governing body's name, IPSC. Solo only. One shooter at a time, over 50 different courses of fire, and a full performance breakdown after each run. Hesitate here and the clock says so out loud.
The module was developed with input from Rasmus "Gylla" Gyllenberg, who SimWay lists as a Nordic champion in dynamic shooting and a professional advisor on its practical shooting simulator. He took the Open division gold at the 2013 IPSC Swedish Rifle Championship. Amateurs and professionals train on the same courses. The tracks are timed and the scoring is unforgiving, and the post-run analysis will tell you exactly which transition cost you the stage.
HUNT PRO vs PRACTICAL: Which Should You Book?
Book HUNT PRO unless you are shooting alone and want a timer. Then book PRACTICAL. Both cost the same and run the same length, so the choice comes down to who is standing at the line.
| HUNT PRO | PRACTICAL | |
|---|---|---|
| Players | 1–2 | 1 (solo only) |
| Focus | Hunting and wildlife scenarios | Competitive IPSC-style shooting |
| Content | 14 game modules, ~40 scenarios | 50+ timed courses |
| Weapon options | SimWay system weapons, or your own with tracking device and laser cartridge | SimWay system weapons, or a laser-fitted real GLOCK-17/19 with reload magazine |
| Feedback | Barrel motion analysis, movement tracking | Full timed performance analysis per run |
| Best for | Families, first-timers, hunters, curious non-shooters | Sport shooters, anyone who thinks in split times |
| Session | 30 min standard, 1–2 shooters | 30 min standard, 1 shooter |
| Price | €20 per session (€10 each for two) | €20 per session |
Pairs default to HUNT PRO, since it is the only one of the two built for a second shooter, and the price does not change for bringing them. PRACTICAL genuinely takes one person at a time, so two people who both want it run it back to back.
Interactive Shooting vs Live Fire: What Is the Real Difference?
The honest difference is consequence, not realism. An interactive shooting simulator teaches the same fundamentals a live-fire session does (sight alignment, grip, trigger control, and follow-through) while removing recoil, noise, ammunition cost, and the age and licensing gates that come with real cartridges. What it cannot give you is the shock of a round going off half a metre from your face. Nothing simulates that.
That trade cuts both ways. The simulator wins on unlimited repetition, instant scoring, visible barrel movement data, scenarios no physical range could ever build, and a price that lets you fail cheaply. Live fire wins on recoil, muzzle blast, muscle memory under genuine stress, and the specific feeling of a hot case bouncing off the lane divider, or occasionally down your collar. The fundamentals, the instructor at your shoulder, and the safety discipline are identical either way.
Plenty of people do both in the same visit. The simulator warms you up and shows you what your hands are doing wrong, then a live-fire package at the range lets you prove it under noise. Run it in that order.
Do You Need a Licence, or Any Experience?
No. No firearms licence is required for interactive shooting at GunRange, and no prior shooting experience is expected of anyone. GunRange lists interactive shooting among its services with no age restriction, available to children, teenagers, adults, and seniors alike. An instructor briefs every session before anyone handles a weapon, replica or real. The requirements are short.
- No firearms licence, of any kind, at any stage of the booking
- No minimum age, unlike our live-fire packages
- No shooting background, not a single previous session
- A safety briefing before you start, which every participant sits through before touching a weapon
The general range rules apply on the simulator floor exactly as they do on the live lanes. The standard of conduct does not change. Replica or real, the weapon is pointed only at the designated target, and the instructor's word is final at all times.
Who Is Interactive Shooting Actually For?
Interactive shooting suits four groups particularly well: families with children too young for live fire, complete beginners who want to learn without noise, hunters preparing for a season, and competition shooters looking for cheap repetition. Rain sends a fifth group down the stairs.
- A family afternoon where a ten-year-old and a grandparent can genuinely compete on the same scoreboard
- A rainy-day plan, an indoor activity in Riga housed in a bunker that does not care what the Baltic sky is doing
- A pre-season warm-up for hunters who want boar scenarios without booking a hunt
- A gift experience for the person who insists they do not want anything
The three-generation booking is the one that surprises people. Bring your parents, let them relive thirty years of hunting stories, and then settle the argument with a scoreboard. Two grown adults arguing over the results of a "kids' activity" is the most honest review our shooting range can get.
There is one group it suits less well. If what you came to Riga for is specifically the noise and the smell of burnt powder, an interactive shooting simulator will feel like a rehearsal rather than the performance. Book a live package instead, or book both and run the simulator first.
What Does a Session Cost and How Long Does It Take?
A SimWay session is €20 for 30 minutes, and that price covers one or two shooters. Two of you can run it together for the same €20, which works out at €10 each. Bring someone. The head-to-head duel scenarios are wasted on a solo booking, and HUNT PRO is built for a pair in the first place.
Thirty minutes is the standard slot and the one the online booking system offers. Longer sessions are possible, so ask when you book if you want the extra time. Fourteen hunting modules and fifty-odd IPSC courses are more than half an hour can cover, and most people work that out somewhere around minute twenty-five.
Every session includes a simulator instructor, the run of the simulator arsenal, and the full scenario set: accuracy drills, hunting, and duels. The booking system holds your slot for a €2 reservation fee and takes the balance at the range. Our range sits at Daugavgrīvas iela 29A in Riga, roughly five minutes from Old Town, open Tuesday to Sunday from 10:00 to 20:00. Book ahead, because there is one simulator station rather than a row of lanes.
Nothing special is required of you on the day. Wear whatever you turned up in, arrive a few minutes early for the briefing, and leave the equipment to the range. No ear protection is needed on the interactive shooting simulator itself. On a live-fire booking that is the one thing you never get to skip.
Our Look at Interactive Shooting
The simulator opens the same room to people the live-fire packages cannot take. The child. The nervous first-timer. The visitor who wants to know what shooting actually is before deciding whether they want the noise.
That is why it earns its slot on the roster. A SimWay session sends people out having watched their own barrel wobble and then seen the score change once they fixed it. Book it as a warm-up before a live package, as a family activity on its own, or as the whole event. All three are fine uses of the room.
Conclusion
An interactive shooting simulator solves a genuine problem. Not everyone should start with a live weapon in their hands, and until recently the only options were to start anyway or not start at all. SimWay gives GunRange a third answer.
Pick HUNT PRO for the scenario and the story, PRACTICAL for the stopwatch. Either way you get real feedback on real technique, on a system Nordic champions train on, with the consequences engineered out.
Then, if the bug bites, the live lanes are down the same corridor.
Book your SimWay interactive shooting session at GunRange and find out who in your group actually has the steadier hand.
The safest shot you will ever fire teaches you the most — and costs you nothing but pride.
FAQ
Do you need a weapons licence for interactive shooting?
No. Interactive shooting at GunRange requires no firearms licence of any kind. The system runs on tracking cameras paired with replica weapons or laser-fitted real ones, so no live ammunition is handled at any point in the session, whichever programme or weapon option you choose. An instructor briefs you before you begin.
What is the difference between SimWay HUNT PRO and PRACTICAL?
HUNT PRO is a hunting and wildlife simulator for 1 to 2 players, with 14 game modules covering clay shooting, wild boar, birds, moose, and deer. PRACTICAL is a solo, competition-style IPSC module with over 50 timed courses and full performance analysis. Both run on the same 30-minute standard session, which costs €20 whether one or two people shoot it, and both can be booked for longer on request.
Can children use the shooting simulator?
Yes. Our interactive shooting activity has no age restriction, so it is open to children, teenagers, adults, and seniors. There is no ammunition, no recoil, and no prior experience required. A supervising adult should still book alongside a child, and the instructor's safety briefing applies to every participant.