After two blockbuster movie adaptations and a number of video game tie-ins, Transformers: War For Cybertron signaled a return to the original Transformers franchise. A prequel to the original cartoon series and toy line, the AAA video game title was crafted to please both hardcore Transformers fans and new audiences, with a special eye towards discerning gamers.
Our challenge was making fans aware of this radical departure from recent Transformers video games, and exciting them about the possibilities of the first non-film-related Transformers game for the current generation of consoles. To that end, we decided to build an online experience that immersed fans in Cybertron, the Transformers’ home planet and the setting of TF:WfC – a world never before explored in video games or live action films.
To whet fans’ appetites as early assets were released and a teaser trailer was unveiled, we created a microsite to heighten the reveal.
On arriving at the site, fans found themselves drifting in space, witnessing the aftermath to what must have been a catastrophic battle. Cybertron hovered in the distance with a massive hole in one side, and debris orbiting it. The silence was broken with an incoming transmission– fragments of video depicting the game’s epic war. Fans were tasked with finding and recovering lost transmissions, cracking the code to uncover the mystery of the War For Cybertron, and experience the first glimpses of the game. Each week, new ‘transmissions’ were added, prompting fans to return regularly to experience new assets and share their findings across forums, blogs and social networks – and speculate about what was still to come.
With the release of the game’s full-length trailer, visitors were brought to Cybertron’s surface in our launch of the full site experience. Not only did we want fans to immerse themselves in the game’s world, but also the look and feel of TF:WfC’s navigation and menu system. We were granted exclusive access to TF: WfC’s beta to faithfully translate the in-game experience into its online counterpart. To heighten the immersion, we included subtle background animations and corresponding ambient sound.
The message was made loud and clear – but gradually – this is not another Transformers Movie game. And with nearly 3 million pageviews and an average of 5 minutes spent on the site, it resulted in a mass exodus to Cybertron, where fans decided to stay for awhile.