Personally, I'm not much of an Angry Birds fan. It's a game wherein you launch a number of birds via slingshot into some kind of breakable construction harbouring green pigs. The goal is to hit all the pigs, which explode on impact. I've played the game, and I don't find it all that challenging or stimulating. Regardless, the game seems to have an immense fan base following. It has been downloaded over 200 million times across all platforms. There's a considerable amount of marketing and merchandising geared towards it, and I feel a lot of the game's support is due to proper / good advertising.
One fantastic example of advertising is the Angry Birds ad put up by T-Mobile in Terrassa near Barcelona. The general idea was that from an android device, individuals had the ability to play a live version of the Angry Birds game. In a booth, people were encouraged to control and launch the birds while a larger screen in front of them mimicked the movements. Once each bird was released, a live version was shot out behind the screen and interacted with some set-up containing the green pigs. I found it fantastic. The creators even included the exploding aspect of the pigs and it appeared as though the launched birds were up for grabs with whomever retrieved them afterwards. I've placed a link to the ad below. Feel free to check it out. You'll want to watch it multiple times.
What I liked most about this ad is that the creators turned the game into a reality. Not only that, but the community was allowed to interact with it. As mentioned, I'm not too fond of the game, but after watching that ad a few times, I felt like giving it another try for a bit.
That is... until I found out the ad was fake. I also managed to find some behind-the-scenes footage of the ad, and it turns out the entire thing was scripted. After I found that out, I guess it made more sense to me since I had been wondering how the sets were managed. For it to have been real, it must have taken a considerable amount of time to set up each pig contraption between 'levels', especially with such a large crowd watching. That aside, I thought it to be a shame the ad was fake. It really would have been a good publicity stunt to let people actually play.
My question to you would be whether or not you still find the ad to be successful even though the depicted event didn`t actually take place. On the one hand, it still involved the community and was a fantastic show, but on the other, we’re lied to as the people didn’t actually play the game in real-time as depicted. Feel free to leave other comments as well.
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Links:
T-Mobile Angry Birds Ad: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jzIBZQkj6SY
Behind the Scenes: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZgsyCHdIiPg&feature=player_embedded#!
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Sources:
- http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-20070580-1/t-mobile-puts-on-life-size-angry-birds-show/
- http://articles.businessinsider.com/2011-05-18/tech/29972670_1_ipad-app-android-smartphone-app
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"Many a small thing has been made large by the right kind of advertising." - Mark Twain
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