Ubisoft’s platform approach helped its Far Cry 6 marketing campaign
In a bid to expand its player base and capture the attention of an inundated mobile audience, Ubisoft shifted gears with its Far Cry 6 marketing campaign by creating targeted content for each social platform and enlisting the actor Giancarlo Esposito to star in fourth-wall-breaking commercials.
If you even vaguely identify as a gamer, you were probably aware of the October 7 release of Far Cry 6, the latest installment in Ubisoft’s popular first-person shooter series. The last edition of Far Cry came out almost four years ago, and Far Cry 6 comes out in a very different landscape. Although games are already on their way to mainstream in 2018, this process has accelerated significantly due to the COVID-19 pandemic – and Ubisoft is looking to expand its audience accordingly.
“We needed to appeal to a younger audience, with a focus on 18-24 year olds who have the potential to develop a more lasting and deep relationship with the Far Cry franchise as we continue to evolve,” said Angela Lin, responsible for the Ubisoft brand. “Young audiences live and breathe digital, which is why our launch campaign was digital first.”
The cross-platform campaign saw Ubisoft and creative agency Funworks working closely with social platforms to create tailored content for each. Across all platforms, the heart of the campaign was Giancarlo Esposito, who played Antón Castillo, the fictional villain of Far Cry 6. In various commercials, Esposito taunts players for not winning the game, sharing tips games and directs scary movies. look at the camera. “All of our videos in this campaign have a 99% plus ratio on YouTube,” Lin said, noting that independent compilations of fan-made ads have garnered hundreds of thousands of views.
The campaign was conceived by Funworks, whose ideation process involves workshops with comedians and improvisers who get a taste of the game. It’s this approach, which Funworks CEO Paul Charney describes as ” the science of fun,” which helped convince Ubisoft to break the fourth wall and go directly to gamers through Esposito ads. “Humor is saying the quiet part out loud,” Charney said.
Once they defined the “big idea” of enlisting Esposito, the creatives at Funworks took the idea to social platforms such as Instagram, Snapchat, and Facebook to determine how best to execute each of them. they. Of the participating platforms, Snapchat was particularly engaged, according to Funworks co-founder Kenny White. “A couple of big things really stood out,” White said. “For me, I think one of them is that they showed us their top-performing ads,” which became a template for Esposito’s dry humor ads.
This enthusiasm aligns with Snapchat’s desire to capitalize on its growing gaming audience. And while the pseudo-interactive and heavily auditory nature of Esposito’s ads made it a natural fit for Snapchat, that transparency was a natural result of Ubisoft and Funworks’ approach to the platform. “By working this far upstream, Funworks was able to develop creatives that adhered to Snap’s best practices,” said Clayton Peters, head of U.S. verticals at Snap, noting that 58% of Snapchatters are console gamers, according to data from the fourth quarter 2020 of GWI. .
That said, feedback on Ubisoft’s Esposito-led marketing campaign hasn’t been entirely positive. for a minority of consumers, the increased interactivity and breaking of the fourth wall can be uncomfortable. For example, some players were disturbed when they emails received supposedly from the Far Cry 6 villain taunting them for giving up and listing game stats such as hours played and number of weapons collected. But the email side of the campaign was entirely separate from Funworks’ social platform, and “the team we worked with at Ubisoft wasn’t top notch either,” Charney said.
Dissenters notwithstanding, Ubisoft’s unusual Far Cry 6 campaign has received a warm welcome from audience members across all platforms. While official campaign results are yet to come, the game developer is already planning to apply the lessons it learned to other platform-focused campaigns in the future.
“Looking at consumer behavior on each platform and adapting assets to that behavior was a huge learning to stand out in a positive way,” Lin said. “Replicate this across multiple social and other channels, and you’re on to something that will delight consumers and make your campaign compelling.”
