NANCHANG, Dec. 26 (Xinhua) -- A new virtual reality (VR) theme park has opened to the public in the city of Nanchang, capital of eastern China's Jiangxi Province, attracting thousands of visitors every day.

The park covers 13,000 square meters, accommodating 120 sets of advanced VR amusement equipment imported from the United States, Germany, Britain and Switzerland.

"Wearing equipment, visitors can experience exciting games, such as deep sea exploration, flying and jungle bungee jumping," said Wang Xiaoqing, vice general manager of the park.

"We had a full-immersion experience. It felt like we were really there," said Wang Shicheng, a citizen, who brought his child to the amusement park and played VR games including deep sea diving and spacewalk.

"There are only a few large-scale VR amusement parks like this in China," said Wang Cuifang, an associate professor of VR industry with the Jiangxi University of Finance and Economics.

Wang said that relying on continually updated VR technologies, the VR amusement industry has huge market potential.

Last month, a VR/AR (augmented reality) science and technology museum opened to the public free of charge in Nanchang. Aiming at popularizing VR technology, visitors can find the application of VR technology in diverse fields, such as education, exhibition and automobile repair.

In the rush to embrace VR, the province of Jiangxi in 2016 launched China's first industrial base for VR, and the city of Nanchang now boasts over 200 VR-related firms.

Nanchang hosted the 2018 World Conference on the VR Industry in October, featuring VR, the latest VR products, artificial intelligence and 5G technology.

China's VR industry has witnessed rapid growth in recent years. The country's VR market expanded 164 percent year-on-year to reach 16 billion yuan in 2017. The market is likely to exceed 90 billion yuan by 2020, according to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.