CLIENT: FUNRISE TOYS | RELEASED: JUN 2006
CHALLENGE
Funrise Toys was planning the North American launch of POG, a game that began 75 years ago and became incredibly popular in the mid to late 90's. Fuel was challenged by our friends there to develop an online game that would provide today's children with a more advanced version of the game, the ability to interact with the toys they bought in-store online - and serve as an online marketing vehicle to introduce people to POG.
STRATEGY
Fuel's approach was to develop an online game that would allow children to use their real POG slammers to unlock virtual ones that they can play with in an online 3D game, as well as to design their own online POG Slammers to play with before buying the product. The game would serve the added purpose of reintroducing youth to the toys and game play to encourage them to buy the real thing.
IDEAS
Players can go into Battlemode with a Slammer they've designed to play against friends over the Internet, or challenge the computer in several different environments, including a dark alley, a boxing ring and a dojo. The website launch occurred in tandem with a large marketing push that included POG tournaments where children could compete for the title of Champion, building excitement across North America for the game.
CREATIVE & EXECUTION
Play as a boy or a girl, select your clothes - even unlock new game costumes as you progress through the game. The POG Slammer customizer allows you to modify your POG with letters, numbers, patterns, stamps and more - with thousands upon thousands of possible custom combinations available.
When you enter the arena, you'll be up against great names of the sport like Krusher Kowalski and Smack Down Susie who will more than likely gain a few feet of air in the process of stealing your POG's with their Slammers. Looking down from above, you must aim your slammer as close to the POG stack as possible to flip as many as possible.
RESULTS
As a result of the online game and associated marketing efforts, the POG website reached over 400,000 unique visitors from January to June, and the average amount of time spent on the site doubled. This increased the overall website ranking by 800% over a four-month timeframe, paving the way for the national launch of the product in August 2006.
