Electronic Arts' ILLEGAL Marketing Campaign

While promoting the new movie tie-in game, The Godfather II, EA would fill the mailboxes of journalists and bloggers with press kits in the shape of cigar boxes, complete with a gold set of real brass knuckles…

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Baas stew It. Many things come to mind when we
think of Electronic Arts. For some, it's how they dominated
the casual gaming market with games like FIFA, Need for Speed,
The Sims, and Madden. For others, they're a constant reminder
of horrible business practices, resulting in being voted the worst
company in America two years in a row and sullying

(00:21):
the reputations of countless legendary franchises. However, something you may
not know about EA is that in two thousand and
nine they took some time away from publishing games and
began moonlighting as armstealers. Yes, you heard that right. In
April of two thousand and nine, while marketing their game
The Godfather II, Electronic Arts sent brass knuckles, which in
many states are classified as deadly weapons that are illegal

(00:43):
to possess to a number of games journalists, including Kataku, Philadelphia,
in Choir, and many many more. How could one of
the biggest, most noteworthy and powerful game publishers in history
think shipping illegal weapons to countless companies would be a
good idea? And what were the effects of their short
lived double lives as accidental armstealers. That's what we're talking

(01:05):
about today. The Godfather Too is an action adventure game
released for PC, Xbox three, sixty and PS three in
two thousand and nine, and, much like the first game
in the series, is a tie in to the media
franchise of the same name. The games are regarded as
Grand Theft Auto clones, not unlike many third person shooters
from around the same time, and see the player exploring
a sandbox world, finding a variety of weapons, stealing cars,

(01:29):
gunning down whoever you want, whenever you want, and are
able to do the main narrative missions at their own pace.
It was a gameplay loop that would be successful with
a number of other franchises of the era like The Getaway,
the true crime series, Saints Roux, Driver Iree, and other
existing media franchise tie ins like The Simpsons, Hit and
Run and Scarface The World Is Yours. This was a

(01:51):
recipe for success that was experiencing hit after hit after
Grand Theft Auto essentially created an entirely new market and
served a largely casual audience, which is exactly the audience
EA had spent decades cornering. So it was no surprise
when EA released the first Godfather game and it became
a commercial success, selling just under two million copies. While

(02:12):
the success of the first game was promising in terms
of a sequel, they wouldn't be able to skirt by
on just two million sales for their next outing. Two
million copies is great on the PS two when fans
were still hungry for this kind of game and budgets
could remain reasonable, but the seventh generation of consoles, those
being the PS three and Xbox three sixty caused serious

(02:32):
change within the gaming industry. Better graphics meant bigger teams.
Bigger teams meant bigger budgets, and when developing for the
PS three, which was notoriously difficult to develop for due
to the unique structure of the cell processor, it was
imperative that EA surpassed the success of the first game.
But the stress doesn't end there. In two thousand and five,
upon the release of the original game, Anthony Puzo, son

(02:54):
of writer Mario Puzo, who wrote the Godfather series of
novels that sparked the entire franchise back in night teen
sixty nine, won a lawsuit against Paramount Pictures for revenue
shares of the games. He would receive a large piece
of the game's original gross as well as a portion
of any other games released in the franchise. With all
these new costs factoring into the sequel, EA knew they

(03:16):
had to do much more than just deliver a good game.
They would have to get creative with their marketing, and
with social media having taken off in recent years, that
is exactly where they would start. In March of two
thousand and nine, just as Facebook games like Farmville, Pet
Society and Mob Wars were reaching their peak, EA created
a Facebook game of their own called Godfather two Crime Rings,
which was released just two months prior to the release

(03:38):
of The Godfather. Too. Like most Facebook games, it wasn't
reviewed particularly well, if at all, with destructoid dot Com
calling it a relatively complicated waste of time. But this
was only one piece of the godfatherto marketing strategy. They
would also release two completely different trailers in the same week,
each of which focusing on different aspects of the gameplay,
and this is where things sat for a while until

(04:00):
the week of the game's launch, when EA would take
one of their biggest risks to date, filling the mailboxes
of journalists and bloggers worldwide with press kits in the
shape of cigar boxes, complete with a shiny gold set
of brass knuckles. To most people, this would have seemed
like a funny surprise, especially from a company like EA,

(04:20):
who has always played their cards incredibly close to the
chest and maintained a level of cold corporate professionalism that
precedes their reputation to this very day. But to others,
what they were holding in their hands and had received
at their work addresses was potentially a Class one misdemeanor
punishable by imprisonment in a county jail not exceeding one year,
and could even land the owner's in state prison. Tweets, posts,

(04:44):
and articles began popping up everywhere, with the journalists and
bloggers who were expected to be praising or remarking positively
on this stunt, either mocking EA for their staggering legal
oversight or legitimately nervous and confused. It would take some
time before EA would comment or respond to anyone on
the matter, but on April eleventh, Kataku would confirm they

(05:05):
had finally made contact with the publisher and the direction
they received was well, not exactly what they'd hoped for.
The article would read the representative that contacted me said
that the company wanted to make sure that the brass
knuckles were properly disposed of. He declined to comment any further.
Contacted by email, Friday, and Electronic Art spokesperson verified that
the company is asking that all of the brass knuckles

(05:26):
shipped out be returned. Now. While this might sound like
the right move on paper, this request is actually making
the situation much more foolish, as while possessing brass knuckles
is illegal in many places, shipping illegal weapons through the
post is also illegal. So now you have a company
who sent unknowing journalists illegal weapons in the mail, then,
after realizing their mistake, requested them to be sent back

(05:49):
through the mail, thus making these individuals even more legally
at risk than before. But hey, all press is good press, right,
and the time of Grand Theft Auto a franchise who
meticulously and successfully drummed up controversy to sell games, surely
a stunt like this could actually help lift a game
to everyone who suddenly knew all too well of the
game's release. This sadly was not the case for The

(06:12):
Godfather too. All it did was draw more attention to
what turned out to be a pretty underwhelming game. The
game would receive mediocre reviews across the board, with much
of the criticism centering around glitches, dated visuals, unsatisfying gameplay,
and lacking any sense of challenge. On top of being
a critical failure, the game would also become a commercial failure,
selling a me easily one hundred and fifty five thousand units

(06:33):
on the Xbox three sixty and an embarrassing ninety one
thousand on the PlayStation three. Plans for a third game
were consequently canceled, and the series remains dead to this
very day. While the publicity stunt of sending brass knuckles
in the mail may not have been the nail in
the game's coffin, as this was rarely, if ever mentioned
in reviews, it's definitely good practice to make sure that
whatever you're sending to the people responsible for bringing attention

(06:55):
to your products is well legal to be sent to
them in the first place. We want more marketing failed
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