'Create an Ad' Competition Entry

Since the closing date was today at 6PM I think it's ok to start posting entries here now, this is what I came up with (note - resized for forum posting, but kept at a reasonable size for readability):

http://img294.imageshack.us/my.php?i...rtforumag6.jpg

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Design notes (in segments as I've removed stuff like where the files are located on the disc which aren't really relevant to anyone but NCSoft):

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I found the usage of stylised icons on the website, which are strongly reminiscent of those found in the game, to be very effective and carry strong brand emphasis. In fact, the European "City of" website designs are, in my opinion a lot more effective and engaging than the US equivalents. The designer responsible achieved the desired effect most efficiently. As such, I took some inspiration from those designs for my idea, please note that the imagery used in my design is all my own work and created from scratch; the closest similarity you will find to the "power icons" used on your site is the green question mark symbol which I used as a reference image to create my vector based equivalent. You should also note that the original design inspiration has been improved upon slightly.

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I felt that earlier "City of" adverts didn't really convey enough information about the game, and instead focused too heavily on showing in-game screen captures, which I don't believe is a particularly strong approach. The game's strengths are more it's unique theme and numerous systems/content along with it's devoted community rather than strictly it's visual detail, although it is certainly not lacking there either. As such I intended to get as much descriptive content and depth into my design as possible whilst keeping it engaging and eye catching, and without going too far as to lose the reader's interest. I chose to create a dynamic background image that would immediately grab the reader's attention on reaching the page, and featured the two most prominent signature characters of the game(s) to add strength to the branding along with the city horizon imagery normally seen behind the City of Heroes/City of Villains logos. In this case I used the City of Villains design as I felt it was visually stronger and complimented the visual impact of my design concept nicely. I created a “starburst” effect and blended it with the imagery of the signature characters and horizon as a Hard Mix which would accentuate the contrast of the underlying designs, and chose to keep the signature characters in full colour but in a desaturated capacity so as not to distract the reader too much from the content contained within the advert. It was important that they blended evenly with the rest of the background composition and their own colours were not too vibrant or distracting. At the same time, however, I thought it would be nice to include their colours rather than simply adding them to the document as a Luminosity layer and thus greyscale against whatever colours were used above or beneath.

The central point of focus is the product title, a retail box shot, the logos of both games and two subtitles conveying the message that both titles have received awards from MMORPG.com and that the product is available in stores now. I felt that keeping the focus simple and informative rather than going overboard with fancy background shapes/imagery and visual designs that popped out or were too “loud” was the way to go. I would then focus on keeping the reader's attention and drawing them into reading more about the product the actual details of the game(s), making those elements visually interesting/inviting and broken down into "bite sized" caption boxes. I included as much marketing spiel as I could dream up without entering too much text as for the reader to lose interest.

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At the base of the design is a "free trial" URL inviting readers to visit a specific webpage address and take a free seven day trial of the game(s), allowing them to experience it first hand, note that I chose seven days as opposed to the fourteen you would normally receive during promotions, or included in the retail packages. This is because I believe that two weeks is an entirely too generous amount of time to give in a trial which is intended to be widely available rather than a limited promotion as with prior promotions, and that seven days would be an entirely adequate duration to whet the redeemer's appetite and give them time to fully appreciate the product. I feel that if the trial was for seven days rather than fourteen it would actually encourage more people to buy the product, rather than the frequent practice of suffering "altitis"/"altoholism" as it has been dubbed by community members and essentially getting burned out on numerous low level characters across the two week duration instead of experiencing more in a shorter time frame.

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Very nicely done Avernal. I like

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Cheers.

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Oh I say, that's rather tasty looking there Av...

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@FloatingFatMan

Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Nice one Avernal - very in the style of the City games, but fresh enough to grab attention

I like.

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"Idealism is such a wonderful thing. All you really need is someone rational to put it to proper use." - Kerr Avon

Myopic Aardvark on Twitter

Thats lovely! - Beautiful colour scheme ,

*must get round to uploading and posting my meagre effort soon as i have a spare few mins.

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I like the fact you've mentioned the awards , I was keeping my fingers crossed that someone would.

It's a very, very nice advert - definitely something that would catch my eye in a magazine.

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At first i thought this was the official add.
I had to actually read all the text boxes to make sure you made it yourself .
Very nicely done. Very profesional and in line with the style of the game boxes. me like

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If I didn't know any better, I'd say you'd ripped that one straight out of a gaming mag. Very clean, very professional, very good.

I kinda miss a few screenshots from the game, but then again if people are interested, they'll find some on the box, right?

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@Moonshade - too many to list anymore

Could always be added into the design too it was just my thinking that the older ads, and pretty much other MMORPG's focus too heavily on filling the page with screenshots, and too little on telling you what the game is about; selling the game by it's graphics alone effectively. Granted there's probably logical reasoning behind their doing that (market studies... blah blah blah), but I just didn't think it was the way to go. CoX is pretty unique and needs to get that message across I feel.

Thanks for the kind words everyone, let's see some more entries posted.

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Nice, clean, informative, visually striking, game identity branding - this is very nice and professional work

I actually don't think the add would be ruined by just 1 or 2 screenshots showcasing the nice graphics of the game - just a matter of keeping them in the same size as the other boxes - but that doesnt subtract from the effort here - super!

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I think it's great, and much better than my one would have been if I'd remembered to enter it.

I do agree a few screenshots would be nice, not too many of course, but if there's an advert for a game, and there's no screens of the game itself, I personally tend to get suspicious, as I wonder why the publishers don't want us to see the game itself.

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