Some scary Halo 3 marketing in Korea
What do you do if you're hired to promote an extremely popular Western video game franchise in a country in which they are clueless to its existence? Well, you have the hero of said video game beat up a dinosaur ... of course! And that's exactly what Microsoft has chosen to do to promote Halo 3 in Korea.
Over on the Korean Halo 3 website Microsoft has posted a few rather odd videos showcasing some of the marketing attempts they've tried to promote the game. Their marketing "events" include a person dressed up as Master Chief scaring shoppers at a local mall, beating up a dinosaur statue and dancing with a random stranger on the subway. And after watching these marketing attempts we've come to the conclusion that either the Microsoft marketing team totally missed the target on their advertising campaign or that the Korean gaming culture is messed up. We're speechless ... just watch the video above and the other after the jump and you'll be just as confused as we are.
[Thanks, zizzy]
Reader Comments (Page 2 of 2)
8-31-2007 @ 9:29PM
finnith said...
This makes me not want to play any videogame...
Ever...
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8-31-2007 @ 11:43PM
Ryan Bond said...
This deserves the biggest WTF i've ever typed.
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9-01-2007 @ 1:34AM
JKYOO said...
I would expect a more corporate blog as xbox360fanboys to be more cautious with the way they handle such contents. This looks nothing like an official Halo 3 marketing campaign and seems far more like an extremely grotesque example of a youtube style UCC content. WTF are you on about sizing up an entire country based on this?
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9-01-2007 @ 1:42AM
JKYOO said...
The video you see here is a viral ad and it isn't supported by microsoft korea although the video is linked to an external website.
This is the official Halo 3 website in Korea. You can check out it's marketing consistency with other regions
http://www.halo3.co.kr/main.html
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9-02-2007 @ 4:22PM
brian said...
When it's completely retarded that people do in Asia that Americans aren't used to, the culture is messed up.
But when it's something completely retarded that people in America do as well (dressing up in costumes of their favorite video game and/or anime characters is the first example that comes to mind), things are viewed a little differently. They're fools, but the entire culture is never labeled "messed up."
Of course being judged by a country whose promotions include slapping the logo on a burger and french fries (obesity, anyone?), where a show like American Idol is constantly number one and whose gaming industry is controlled by politicians who have probably never played a game in their lives essentially renders all these judgements meaningless outside these borders. I find the video amusing just like the next guy, but the context it's put in is fairly, well, stupid. I would have expected it on some other blog, but I'm surprised I found it here.
While we're on the topic of analyzing other cultures, this is pretty much the only country in the world where killings and shootings are constantly linked to video games. How "messed up" is our gaming culture, then?
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9-03-2007 @ 8:45PM
Brian said...
Seriously? Seriously? ... Seriously?
Wow... I've seen more professional commercials for pawn shops.
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9-11-2007 @ 6:31PM
Lesbian Ham said...
someone ytmnd this, please - the dinosaur-punching bit.
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