2016 Asia-Pacific Stevie Awards Gold Winner - The Spaceship
Company: The Spaceship, Chippendale, Australia
Category: Award for Innovation in the Use of Celebrities or Public Figures
Entry Title: Rise of Tomb Raider Asia Launch
The Tomb Raider is the iconic video game franchise starring its beautiful and fearless protagonist, Lara Croft, battling enemies through highly-challenging environments using improvised weapons and gadgets. With the exclusive launch of the Rise of the Tomb Raider on Xbox making the event a natural magnet for worldwide attention, Xbox sought to elevate the game experience even further by bringing Lara Croft herself to life for fans here in Asia.
We created and executed a clever stunt-lead idea that developed into an all-encompassing fan focused campaign. It featured a death-defying stunt and interactive fun contests using Twitch, allowing the team to deliver unparalleled fan engagement for Rise of the Tomb Raider in Asia through this ground-breaking digital campaign.
Client Agreed Objective:
• 2 x Engagement rate on Social • 500K Views of Content
• 50 Media Clippings
Execution and tactics
1. High-impact stunt and fan engagement activities:
a. Renowned Lara Croft cosplayer, Jenn Croft, leapt off the world’s highest bungee jump at Macau Tower, decked out in the latest Tomb Raider outfit and accessories.
b. Fans could #HackTheIce through the twitter hashtag to reveal prizes embedded in eight Rise of the Tomb Raider themed ice sculptures.
2. Social & Digital:
a. The entire event, from the death-defying stunt, fan engagement contests, unveiling of never-before-seen Rise of the Tomb Raider footage, meet-and-greets and question-and-answer sessions were all streamed live over Twitch – a first for a game launch in Asia.
b. Fans who tuned in participated by tweeting in their questions bearing the #HackTheIce hashtag, and voted for the ice sculpture to be hacked by Jenn Croft, to reveal prizes for participating fans.
c. The sequence of events were also amplified via Xbox and Microsoft social media channels across Asia.
3. Media outreach with PR content
a. A media release on the #HackTheIce campaign was disseminated to media across Asia, and posted on the Microsoft Asia News Center.
Results
In line with Lara Croft’s personal adventures in Rise of the Tomb Raider, the #HackTheIce Campaign has shown that the bold execution of big ideas and going off the beaten track can lead to great rewards:
• The campaign generated the highest-ever digital sales for any Tomb Raider version on Xbox.
• The video game content created for the campaign was viewed more than 1,000,000 times.
• The interactive live stream event saw nearly 600 questions tweeted over just two hours, and reached close to 600,000 fans from around the world via social media.
• The media outreached garnered 66 stories across multiple markets in the region.
Supporting Materials:
