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$347 Million Saudi Entertainment Destination Announced
SEVEN Abha will feature 8 huge attractions, including a family entertainment center with world-class rides, arcade games, and VR areas.
SEVEN (Saudi Entertainment Ventures), a subsidiary of the Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund (PIF), has announced plans to build its 5th entertainment destination in the Kingdom after a $347 cash injection.
The new park will be strategically located between Abha and Khamis Mushait, near the Abha International Airport. The plans for the project are impressive, with eight different zones spanning a total area exceeding 79,000 square meters.
Renowned architectural and design studio Gensler drew inspiration for the park from the ancient stone buildings indigenous to the Aseer region. Meanwhile, the plans follow The Urban Code of Aseer Region, prioritizing “excellence in urban planning, design, landscape, and architecture”.
Prince Turki bin Talal bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud, Chairman of the Aseer Development Authority (ASDA), commented: “The Aseer region is experiencing an unprecedented renaissance across various sectors, thanks to the unwavering support from our leadership. SEVEN’s entertainment destination in Abha is a key project for Aseer, supporting our ambition to become a year-round global destination”.
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Chairman of SEVEN, Abdullah AlDawood, added, “Abha represents another ambitious project as part of our efforts to bolster the entertainment sector throughout the Kingdom. By 2030, we anticipate a GDP contribution exceeding SAR 4 billion and over 5 million visitors. Moreover, this project will create hundreds of direct and indirect job opportunities for the people of Aseer”.
SEVEN Abha will feature eight distinct zones or attractions, including a family entertainment center with arcade games, world-class rides, and virtual reality areas. Additionally, Discovery Adventures, a jungle-themed edutainment attraction, has been developed in partnership with Warner Bros, and there will also be a PLAY-DOH-themed entertainment center courtesy of Hasbro.
Finally, the massive entertainment site will offer indoor golfing, live entertainment, multi-level e-karting, futuristic bowling, and a 10-screen AMC cinema.
News
Google Releases Veo 2 AI Video Tool To MENA Users
The state-of-the-art video generation model is now available in Gemini, offering realistic AI-generated videos with better physics, motion, and detail.
Starting today, users of Gemini Advanced in the MENA region — and globally — can tap into Veo 2, Google’s next-generation video model.
Originally unveiled in 2024, Veo 2 has now been fully integrated into Gemini, supporting multiple languages including Arabic and English. The rollout now brings Google’s most advanced video AI directly into the hands of everyday users.
Veo 2 builds on the foundations of its predecessor with a more sophisticated understanding of the physical world. It’s designed to produce high-fidelity video content with cinematic detail, realistic motion, and greater visual consistency across a wide range of subjects and styles. Whether recreating natural landscapes, human interactions, or stylized environments, the model is capable of interpreting and translating written prompts into eight-second 720p videos that feel almost handcrafted.
Users can generate content directly through the Gemini platform — either via the web or mobile apps. The experience is pretty straightforward: users enter a text-based prompt, and Veo 2 returns a video in 16:9 landscape format, delivered as an MP4 file. These aren’t just generic clips — they can reflect creative, abstract, or highly specific scenarios, making the tool especially useful for content creators, marketers, or anyone experimenting with visual storytelling.
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To ensure transparency, each video is embedded with SynthID — a digital watermark developed by Google’s DeepMind. The watermark is invisible to the human eye but persists across editing, compression, and sharing. It identifies the video as AI-generated, addressing concerns around misinformation and media authenticity.
While Veo 2 is still in its early phases of public rollout, the technology is part of a broader push by Google to democratize advanced AI tools. With text-to-image, code generation, and now video creation integrated into Gemini, Google is positioning the platform as a full-spectrum creative assistant.
Access to Veo 2 starts today and will continue expanding in the coming weeks. Interested users can try it out at gemini.google.com or through the Gemini app on Android and iOS.
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