Xbox Sea Of Thieves Launch
Pirates were set to invade Canada.
Sea of Thieves is an open world, cut-throat game that takes place on the high seas. Players get to step into the stanky boots of a swashbuckling avatar, look for treasure, and blow up every ship that sails across their path. For the Canadian launch, XBox Canada challenged us to build anticipation among gamers in a way that embraced the game’s playful take on pirates. The brand was already set to repurpose a lot of the American assets, so the goal was not to create another launch trailer. Instead, they wanted a solution that embraced the game’s playful take on pirates BUT in a way that felt tailored to Canadians.
Who says you can’t make a reality show spin off of a video game?!
Sea of Thieves is set in an immersive open world that aims to make players feel like real pirates. And just like the real seas, one thing is true of the game’s digital seas - the best pirate wins. We leaned into this one-upmanship quality of the game and pitched an online, episodic reality show called “Who’s More Pirate.” The show would set a crew of professional gamers up against a crew of real Canadian pirates (or the closest thing we could find) in a series of challenges that would ultimately determine a winner.
Four Canadian streamers were brought aboard the campaign to go head-to-head against a fishing crew from the discovery channel’s “Cold water Cowboys.”
The gamers all had loyal online fanbases, while the Cold Water Cowboys had recently earned some pop culture cred. With Sea of Thieves promising broad appeal, our casting strategy was designed to bring in both hardcore and casual gamers, as well as casual gamers who were general pop culture enthusiasts.
Each episode of the 4-part series was designed to highlight one unique quality of Sea of Thieves.
The launch episode, for instance, was inspired by how fun it is to blow 💩up in the game.
Game screen shot.
The next Episode was based on the unique ability to play instruments with your crew in Sea of Thieves.
the result of each episode (and the series) was handed to fans.
Each episode ended by asking the internet to vote for who was “more pirate” with team hashtags. In the end, it was a tie, seriously.