No, you didn’t have so much to drink last night that your mind is still playing tricks on you! This is actually an LED installation that responds in real-time to your steps. From now till October 25th, the people in Berlin who dare to walk over it at the Hauptbahnhof train station, will take part in an interactive installation called ‘Onskebronn’ (Norwegian for ‘wishing well’). It was created by German Sven Beyer of the performing arts group Phase 7.
The Ontario Science Centre in Toronto has something like this, only it’s projected onto the floor from above. But it does respond when you walk over it.
They have something like this at the American Airlines Center in Dallas. During Stars games it is a little hockey rink where kids (or big kids) can stomp about on it to knock the puck around and try to get it in the goal (sort of like air hockey).
That sounds way cooler than what I remember at the science centre. I think it was just ripples or something.
It was probably used first in places such as you mentioned with less sensitivity and such, and then sold as a commercial product later on.