D&D is now in (exceedingly awesome) commercial form

[Haffrung Helleyes]

Wow

What an insanely cool ad! Then again, I am definitely the target audience -- I associate the sound of Led Zepellin with old memories of playing RPGs at my friend's house.

Ken

 

[IronWolf]

Is it wrong that I recognised every one of the pictures?

No. It means you are one of us.

 

[TarionzCousin]

Are you [-]saying[/-] snorting that heavy metal isn't rebellious? Seriously?

Not for twenty years at least. Seriously.

I've put the question to the jury here. Everybody is welcome to vote.

 

[Mark CMG]

If I walk into a gay bar, and I see one of the beer taps is rainbow colored and the handle is shaped like a man's torso, I don't think, "What a strange marketing campaign for Miller Light." Instead, I assume the marketing campaign is aimed at a particular group of people who will appreciate the outreach.

I'm glad that Pawsplay is out of his D&D closet. There aren't many openly gay D&D players and I wish there were more.

Different taps for different chaps.

 

[demetri0us]

I like it. I can't say I really understand why folks who play D&D wouldn't. Clearly, they are trying to play towards an audience that would recognize the images and/or be interested enough to go find out more.

I'm not sure what folks would prefer in a commercial for D&D. That's not to say this is the paragon of what a D&D commercial could be, but I can tell you, this:

If WotC had used real live people (at a gaming table or in an imagination-LARPY-kinda-thing, it would have been all sorts of campy. Can you imagine it? No matter how they did it, it would be a joke. And CG? Well, I'd be to do that right, it would be super expensive, and still, it'd have to be amazing to not nudge right up against joke-dom.

This commercial seems pretty solid to me. Though, I don't like music. Not that they need to cater to me mind you!

 

[Darynal]

Different taps for different chaps.

Lol. Indeed.

I like it. I can't say I really understand why folks who play D&D wouldn't. Clearly, they are trying to play towards an audience that would recognize the images and/or be interested enough to go find out more.

The ad definitely has a narrow appeal due to that. I thought it was alright, but honestly the beginning kind of confused me.. and it was only because I recognized the old d&d art that I got it half-way through.

Which is kind of beyond the "either you got my attention, or you don't" point when it comes to ads. Most people probably would have shut their attention off from it, but it's still kind of a cool ad I guess

 

[Toben the Many]

Well, the ad is obviously directed at two different groups of people. By putting it in the red box, by calling it the red box, and by putting the old art on the cover, they are obviously going to the nostalgia factor. They are aiming right at all of the lapsed players who will get a zap of good memories from the art and the music, frankly. When I first started playing, that was most certainly the kind of music I listened to and what was on the cassette tape at the time.

However, I think it's very effective for new players as well. Most kids that I know love retro stuff and retro-feeling material. They listen to most of the same music that I listened to in the 70's and 80's. But what's more is that the ad is just very intriguing. I like the fact that the ad doesn't really tell you much. What you want someone to do is to get intrigued and go out and explore what the heck the red box is and what it's all about.

One more thing - there's just no way you could inject a full description of what the red box is into a 30 second ad. Especially not without it being cheesy. I love what they've done with this.

 

[CharlesRyan]

I'm not sure what folks would prefer in a commercial for D&D. That's not to say this is the paragon of what a D&D commercial could be, but I can tell you, this:

If WotC had used real live people (at a gaming table or in an imagination-LARPY-kinda-thing, it would have been all sorts of campy. Can you imagine it? No matter how they did it, it would be a joke. And CG? Well, I'd be to do that right, it would be super expensive, and still, it'd have to be amazing to not nudge right up against joke-dom.

I think this is a really good point. There is no way to communicate the essence of D&D in a 30-second TV spot in a straight-up manner. The imagery associated with gameplay is frankly boring at best. Imagery associated with what the game is about (CGI dragons and whatnot) is even more closely associated with electronic games and movies. Mixing them would give you a modern version of those horrible TSR ads from the 80s.

The trick is to make an ad that communicates the FUN associated with the game without getting too literal about it. I think this ad does so while going down the nostalgia path. There may be other ways to do it without nostalgia. But anything that works is NOT going to be a literal ad about how to play RPGs or what's in the basic game box.

 

[Aeolius]

When I first started playing, that was most certainly the kind of music I listened to and what was on the cassette tape at the time.

By contrast, this is the kind of music I was listening to, when I first started playing:
[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-atojk5e0o"]Volcano[/ame]

and:
[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fpWNimba344"]Equinoxe[/ame]

Maybe I've been playing D&D wrong, all these years!

 

[w_earle_wheeler]

I mentioned this in the other thread about this commercial, but the reason I feel that the "cheap" nature of the commercial works is that it fits in well with [adult swim] style cartoons and marketing.

When I saw the commercial, it was on Hulu.com while I was watching Caprica. It fit in seamlessly with the other ads, even though the budget was obviously much, much lower.

I enjoyed the "commercial" so much that I posted it on my Facebook, even though I already own the new Red Box (and was unimpressed with it) and I probably won't be buying D&D4es products from Target.

It certainly targets me as a person who could recognize 90% of the artwork instantly. I marked out at the cheap little animated version of Fiend Folio monsters. But, oddly enough, I found the flash cartoons WotC had during the beginning of 4e to be too amateurish -- a strange dichotomy, I know.