vgZero Top 10 - Dumbest Video Game Publicity Stunts

This week Electronic Arts launched a publicity stunt for the highly-anticipated Mass Effect 3 by releasing a very limited number of weather balloons carrying copies of the game into space and allowing fans to hunt for the early copies once they land back on Earth. Cool idea, harmless fun, right? That's far more than we can say for these other ridiculous publicity stunts.

10. Dante's Inferno
There's always some level of controversy surrounding especially violent and mature-themed video games, though like most other forms of media, the large-scale public outcries are largely a thing of the past. Electronic Arts seems to pine for the old days when protests and petitions gave violent games some free added publicity, so they decided to do one themselves. The publisher hired actors to stage a protest outside of the LA Convention Center at E3 in 2009, supposedly disgusted with the Satanic themes that would be featured in the forthcoming title Dante's Inferno. The protesters carried signs that read things like "trade in your playstation for a praystation" and "EA = Electronic Anti-Christ" and even attracted some attention from media outlets. Once the protest was revealed to be a PR stunt, most agreed that the scheme was in poor taste and, ironically enough, it annoyed some religious groups that EA would portray them in such a derogatory manner as a means of publicity.

9. Resident Evil 5
In celebration of the release of Resident Evil 5 in 2009, Capcom decided to give away a trip to Africa, the game's primary setting. A reasonable enough idea on its own, but the manner in which they gave away the trip could have been handled a lot better. The company spread out severed prosthetic limbs covered in fake blood and chicken livers around London, encouraging participants to find the body parts and take them to the Westminster Bridge, hold them in the air, and yell out "kijuju!" to win their way to Africa. Besides the fact that it is likely to freak out other passers-by unaware of the competition, several of the limbs went missing prompting Capcom to release a statement calling for people to dispose of them "carefully" (a severed arm or head in a garbage can might attract some unwanted attention) or to return them. Furthermore, there were some concerns over the potentially harmful effects of bacteria contained within the chicken livers if ingested. Despite numerous complaints from residents, Capcom was not charged for their stupidity.

8. Mafia Wars
Even free-to-play games need publicity, but they should be more thoughtfully considered than Zynga's marketing ploy for Mafia Wars in 2010. The company glued dozens of fake $25,000 bills to sidewalks in San Francisco, which may have induced some hilarity for the developer as skeptical citizens made futile attempts to pick up the fraudulent bank notes. The city's public works department was not amused, however, as it took time, staff, and a steam cleaner to remove the fake bills. The city billed Zynga for the clean-up, ordered that any and all information regarding who and what was involved in the marketing ploy be handed over, and pursued legal action against the company for street vandalism.

7. Mercenaries 2: World in Flames
The Venezuela-based Electronic Arts 2008 game Mercenaries 2: World in Flames uses fuel as currency, so the publisher tied this concept into a kind marketing gesture whereby the company would have employees dressed up as militants at a London gas station distribute up to £40 of free fuel to each lucky customer. While the event sent hundreds of extremely happy motorists away with a full tank of free gas, it left hundreds more extremely angry motorists caught in the chaos and gridlock that ensued from the promotion. Eventually police had to shut the operation down due to its adverse effects on traffic flow and a local member of Parliament demanded an apology.

6. Red Faction: Guerrilla
There are certainly a lot of video games that encourage players to commit criminal acts, but it is usually with the recognition of the idea that such acts are not to be carried out after they're done playing. In 2009 though, THQ basically rewarded people willing to commit a crime with free copies of Red Faction: Guerrilla. The company placed 100 copies of the game in a parked car on a street in London, and chained a shiny new sledge hammer nearby. Those with little enough moral integrity to smash out the windows of the car would be welcome to take a copy (or 100) of the game for themselves. Though there are pictures (like the one below) of people committing the act, there are also suspicions as to whether THQ purposely got the party started themselves with one of their own.

5. Burnout 2: Point of Impact
Speaking of encouraging people to commit crimes, Acclaim utilized a similarly stupid marketing ploy for Burnout 2: Point of Impact. To raise awareness of the release of the game on October 11, 2002, the publisher offered to pay for any speeding fines issued in the UK on that day. Obviously the government and law enforcement officials were not amused by the prospect of giving millions of motorists a free pass to drive recklessly fast for a day, so the plan was cancelled before it could be put into action.

4. God of War 2
The God of War series is recognized as one of the most gruesomely violent franchises in the industry, but nobody really expected Sony to translate this theme into a real-world event. In addition to topless women and a live snake pit, a 2007 God of War 2 launch party held in Athens featured a freshly decapitated goat that was stuffed with warm offal meant to resemble the animal's intestines and encouraged attendees to compete to see who could eat the most innards. While the event was disturbing enough in and of its own, Sony then ran pictures of the event in the Official PlayStation Magazine with the goat's bloodied head that dangled from the body pixelated to spare readers from the obscenity. After some public outrage, particularly from animal welfare groups, Sony recalled 80,000 issues of the magazine featuring the images and issued an official apology.

3. Homefront
Foresight apparently isn't a characteristic a lot video game companies take under consideration when hiring their marketing departments. As a publicity stunt for the much-hyped shooter Homefront in 2011, publisher THQ released 10,000 red balloons carrying GameStop promotions for the game from the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco, which the company said would "simulate a method used by South Korea to send messages of hope to the North" in the game. Just a few blocks away though lay the beloved San Francisco Bay, which soon became covered with thousands of the balloons when wind and rain and pushed them in that direction, prompting concerns of environmental damage. Though THQ reassured upset citizens that the balloons were bio-degradable, the littered bay became an eyesore and the company hired a crew to clean up the debris.

2. ShadowMan 2
Hordes of terrible games may have contributed the most to Acclaim's demise, but we'll add a lack of basic morals to the list of reasons as well. In 2002 the company showed great kindness by offering grieving families some financial help with burial costs - all they had to do was allow Acclaim to desecrate the grave of their loved ones by putting an advertisement for ShadowMan 2 on the gravestone. The publisher attempted to justify the marketing ploy by suggesting that they would be assisting "poorer families" with their financial burdens. In addition to being incredibly immoral, it is illegal to advertise outdoors without a permit and there are laws against desecration as well.

1. Splinter Cell: Conviction
We're not sure how holding up a bar at gunpoint relates to Ubisoft's 2010 game Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Conviction, nor can we discern what kind of moronic marketing group would think this to be a good way to promote a game or anything else, but someone managed to pull it all together. A man with his hands wrapped in bandages showed up to a bar in Auckland, New Zealand and pulled out a realistic-looking fake gun and began threatening terrified patrons, sending them diving for cover. After a few tense moments once the police showed up, it was realized that the gun was a fake and that the whole scene was publicity stunt for the new Splinter Cell game. The police called the promotion "ill-advised" and the marketing company behind the event issued an apology saying, "It was just marketing gone wrong." It's frightening to consider how many different ways this idea could have ended in tragedy under slightly different circumstances.

Written by: Mike Glubish

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