Turning a climbing wall into a video game

Really cool project, people might actually pay for a setup like that to show up around town given that response.

Timing could be automated with a webcam and CV to just watch for any motion near the markers. With a recording of each run, you could push ghosted runs through the projector like racing games.

Absolutely. Automating this would be a great idea, was actually what I thought was happening on first watch.

It's clever as since the image is small, isolated graphics and the interaction is quite close to the surface it helps with reducing the typical problem of shadows obscuring a projection.

Kinda like a live action Mega Girp: http://doougle.net/projects/mega-girp.html

I've always thought it would be fun to somehow incorporate technology into climbing for tracking or otherwise augmenting the experience.

Time trials sound like a quick avenue to painful injury, though. If I were a gym, I'd be cautious in encouraging it. In my experience, climbing prowess is not a matter of speed but control -- the more statically you can complete a route the more control you demonstrate. A friend of mine once said his goal is to complete a route as silently as possible, avoiding accidental scuffs of his shoes or knocking of his knuckles on the wall. This is actually a great measure of control, too.