As protests against police brutality stretched into Pride Month amid an ongoing pandemic, the confluence has brought about important conversations around intersectionality, racial injustice and the importance of human empathy. These swirling forces of social change have also worked their way into Animal Crossing: New Horizons, the Nintendo Switch game that launched just as the…
Gaming is surging as people stay at home during the pandemic, but marketers face distinct challenges of activating in an environment that’s unlike traditional media. The IAB concluded its weeklong virtual NewFronts presentation today with a series of discussions on the rise of gaming and esports, and how marketers are approaching the space. “Whether it’s…
A new Minecraft map is attempting to teach kids about the effectiveness of social distancing by way of zombies and potions. Mojang, the Microsoft-owned Swedish developer behind the popular open-world game, and agency AKQA have partnered on a new pandemic simulator map that allows players to test how various social distancing measures are able to…
Facebook Gaming accelerated the global release of its stand-alone application, rolling it out worldwide on the Google Play Store for Android devices Monday. The app has been in testing for the past 18 months in Southeast Asia and Latin America, with over 5 million installs in those areas, and Facebook said an iOS version will…
Facebook will not be participating in this year’s Game Developers Conference, March 16 through 20 in San Francisco, due to concerns over Covid-19, more commonly known as coronavirus. The company said it is removing the Facebook Gaming and Oculus booth footprints from the Moscone Center floor and advising against its employees traveling during the event….
When ad agency Wieden + Kennedy first approached Psyop with the idea for a dating simulator based around the KFC franchise–starring the brand’s namesake Colonel as a romance-able character–one of Alexei Bochenek’s first thoughts was that if he didn’t ultimately win this pitch, then he’d have to “resign in shame.” Bochenek ultimately served as the…
Cannabis was the first product ever sold over the internet in 1971 between MIT and Stanford computer science students, according to Daily Bonfire host Ngaio Bealum. HelloMD has launched its own type of HQ Trivia in an effort to educate folks about weed in an app called Daily Bonfire. Every Monday, Wednesday and Friday at…
Have you heard of Stadia? While the Google initiative has been a buzzworthy point of discussion in the video game industry, it hasn’t often broken through into mainstream conversation. That’s something the tech giant obviously hopes to change as the platform launches this week. Stadia is Google’s newest gaming platform, allowing users to access and…
PALM SPRINGS, Calif. – “Negativity and toxicity are way too prevalent in gaming,” said Chris Bruzzo, CMO of Electronic Arts. For its part, EA banned 50,000 user accounts that had hate speech in their titles last month. The company has also recently created a healthy communities summit to help combat negativity in gaming. More than…
Game-streaming megastar Michael “Shroud” Grzesiek is leaving Twitch for Mixer, marking another coup in the fledgling Microsoft service’s bid to take on its larger Amazon-owned rival. The move comes after fellow superstar Tyler “Ninja” Blevins made waves with his own defection from Twitch to Mixer in August. Although Mixer’s estimated 30 million viewership hours logged…
When athletes bring something new to a longstanding sport, they’re often accused of playing or acting “wrong”–until everyone else starts doing it too. In the new ad for EA’s FIFA 20 video game, London agency Adam&eveDDB turns this accusation into a badge of honor, showing athletes across soccer and other sports who’ve been questioned about…
The League of Legends World Championship 2019–the biggest event in esports–will play out in the global capital of fashion, so it’s fitting that developer Riot Games has linked up with Louis Vuitton to bring some new style to the game. The fashion house has designed a trophy case for the online arena battle multiplayer game’s…
Have you ever dreamed of attending a highly competitive culinary school and, if you play your cards right, getting scooped like mashed potatoes into the gravy-slathered bowl of Colonel Sanders’ love? Either way, your chance is nearly here, because KFC is preparing to launch a free game called “I Love You Colonel Sanders! A Finger…
“Data excite advertisers.” What a great line from Ken Auletta in The New Yorker. Auletta argues: In the advertising world, Big Data is the Holy Grail, because it enables marketers to target messages to individuals rather than general groups, creating what’s called addressable advertising. “Addressable advertising.” Help us, Lord. Tracking digital movements of the people […]
The post Data Is The Machine-Fed Marketing Narcotic…Drip, Drip, Drip appeared first on Adpulp.
Wexley School for Girls won Best Of Show at the 2017 American Advertising Awards Seattle (still known as the ADDYs) for the following War Dragons spot. Ads for adventure-focused video games tend to stay pretty straightforward, which is partially why the dark humor and unexpected twists of this spot work so well. As Ian Cohen […]
The post War Dragons And Wexley Emerge Victorious At The Seattle ADDYs appeared first on AdPulp.
Ad agency interns love to get real-world experience. Sometimes that means actually working for real clients. Other times it means sitting around playing 8-bit video games.
The interns at Ottawa, Ontario, agency McMillan get to do a bit of the latter—thanks to a game called Interns, which is a bit of goofy 8-bit fun that simulates the intern experience.
“We didn’t want our interns here at McMillan to feel unprepared or unappreciated, so we created an 8-bit video game that featured them as playable characters,” the agency tells us.
The object of the game: Walk around the office collecting 10 ideas for an upcoming client presentation. It’s a bit ridiculous, but also amusing enough, and more edifying than getting coffee for everyone. Props, too, for the AdFreak mention.
“I need your clothes. Your boots. And your motorcycle.”
Arnold Schwarzenegger really needs some new material. A quarter-century after walking naked into a seedy bar and uttering that famous line in Terminator 2: Judgment Day, Arnie’s still sizing up biker-dive patrons with his robo-vision and ordering folks to strip down and surrender their modes of transportation.
Here, the action-movie icon re-enacts that memorable scene in a fun spot for game maker 2K promoting its upcoming WWE 2K16 title. in which Schwarzenegger’s Terminator is a playable character for fans who pre-order.
“It’s a nerd’s dream: a painstaking recreation of a classic film with a relevant twist to the cast,” says Pete Harvey, creative director at barrettSF, which made the spot. “Our hope is that people pull up this scene with the original to compare what stayed absolutely consistent and what subtly changed.”
The most obvious change is the supporting cast, with real-life WWE stars such as Eva Marie, Daniel Bryan and Finn Bálor playing barflies and waitstaff. (Dean Ambrose is so going to wish he’d used an ashtray to put out that cigar.) There is no sign of Hulk Hogan—and I have a feeling he won’t be baaack anytime soon.
Also, in the cinematic original, Schwarzenegger was a sculpted god whose body epitomized muscly manhood, even if he was all transistors underneath. Today, though still in good shape, Arnie looks more like an aging, confused ex-governor of California, searching in vain for a bill he can veto.
CREDITS
Client: 2K
Campaign: Raise Some Hell – “Biker Bar”
Agency: barrettSF
Creative Director: Pete Harvey
Senior Art Director: Brad Kayal
Senior Copywriter: Brad Phifer
Integrated Producer: Nicole Van Dawark
Assistant Producer: Heather Bernard
Managing Director: Patrick Kelly
Account Director: Brittni Hutchins
Account Manager: Jillian Gamboa
Production Company: Acne
Director/Director of Photography: Anders Jedenfors
Executive Producer (Production Co): Rania Hattar
CEO/Executive Producer: Line Postmyr
Line Producer: Taylor Pinson
Production Designer: Joshua Strickland
Editorial Company: The Vault
Editor: Kevin Bagley
Assistant Editor: Dustin Leary
Recording Studio: One Union Recording
Engineer: Eben Carr
Engineer: Matthew Zipkin
Executive Producer: Lauren Mask
Sound Designer: Joel Raabe
Animation Company: Oddfellows
Creative Director: Chris Kelly
Animator: Cosmo Ray
Animator: Stan Cameron
Executive Producer: TJ Kearney
Producer: Erica Kelly
Color Correction: Apache
Colorist: Shane Reed
Executive Producer: LaRue Anderson
Producer: Caitlin Forrest
Finshing: Everson Digital
Smoke Artist: Mark Everson
Old Spice is tapping into the gamer community, which clearly overlaps with its own target, with an interesting campaign on Twitch—the live social video platform for gamers—in which viewers get to control a real human being dropping in a forest for three days.
Beginning Thursday at 10 a.m. PT, visitors to twitch.tv/oldspice will use the site’s chat feature to send commands to the man to perform. Users will work together to unlock achievements or activities for Nature Man. (“Arm wrestle an obviously fake bear? Hear stories from a wise tree? Stumble across interesting and good smelling characters? The scenarios are endless—and completely up to the participating gamers,” says Wieden + Kennedy, which built the experience.)
Beyond that, well, we’ll just have to see how it unfolds.
“Old Spice is thrilled to bring an outdoor gaming experience like no other to our fans and the Twitch community,” Kate DiCarlo, communications manager for P&G beauty care, tells AdFreak. “We’re always looking for new ways to entertain and build brand loyalty with our fans, and Twitch is the perfect partner to help us reach the gaming and live streaming culture in an authentic way. Plus, with scent names like Timber, Amber and Citron, we couldn’t think of a better way to celebrate our new nature-inspired Fresher Collection.”
The stream will run from 10 a.m. to sundown PT on Thursday, Friday and Saturday.
FCB West created a campaign promoting the release of Electronic Art’s Dragon Age Inquisition, centered around broadcast and online trailers.
The trailers feature dramatic gameplay footage designed to pique viewers interest in the game, which was released this Thursday. In the 80-second broadcast spot, “The Breach,” for example, an epic battle ends with a dragon blowing fire at the screen, which turns into the title and release date, accompanied by the tagline “Lead them or fall.”
But FCB West’s campaign doesn’t end with the trailers, as the agency created a whole interactive experience which “both challenges and rewards fans with bonus content like no other advertising campaign to date.” The agency created “Quest for the Red Lyrium Reapers,” an interactive experience at DragonAge.com which challenges players with finding hidden content within the game’s campaign videos, and offers a unique incentive: an in-game weapons pack. It’s an interesting approach to get fans engaged with FCB’s campaign, and one that makes the content relevant past the release date. Stick around for the online trailer (along with credits) after the jump. (more…)
New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.
BBH New York enlisted dancers from the New York City Ballet for a series of ads depicting victory celebrations for PS4, an extension of the “Greatness Awaits” campaign.
Each of the six spots begins with a group of dancers performing classic ballet moves in scenery/dress meant to evoke certain styles of games (sports, space, war, etc.) before a musical change signifies a shift in style and they perform a more modern victory dance. At the end of each 30-second spot, viewers are invited to contribute to the linked social initiative, calling on gamers to submit their own victory dance on Instagram for a chance at winning a PS4. At this point, any gaming advertising that tries something different is a welcome departure, and the social initiative has the potential to lead to some fun engagement with fans. We do wish, however, that they had managed a take of “Dunk” (stick around for it after the jump) where she actually makes the shot. (more…)
New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.
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