Case study: How Final Fantasy reached new players on its 16th game

While the connection between sports and gaming may seem tenuous to those unfamiliar with one or both fandoms, Rebel based its decision on a core insight: out of 86 million action role-playing game players, three out of five are sports fans.

Publisher and developer Square Enix also reported a strong start by selling over three million copies of the game within one week of its release date, though it’s difficult to determine how much of that success can be attributed to the athlete campaign, said Craig Howe, Rebel Ventures CEO.

The momentum for the game appears to have slowed considerably, though its marketing approach isn’t to blame, according to Square Enix. The developer reported operating profit loss of 79% in its last earnings report, largely citing Final Fantasy XIV sale drop off due to the slow adoption of PlayStation 5, the console that the game is exclusively available on.

How Rebel picked its athletes

Seasoned gamers may not be surprised to see the WWE’s Austin Creed, who has a popular gaming channel UpUpDownDown, participate in the campaign. While his gaming experience was a boon, it wasn’t the only thing Rebel sought in its athletes.

Rebel’s primary goal was to capture a global audience by featuring athletes from a variety of sports that could appeal to specific audiences Sony and Square Enix identified as having a high demand for the game. Creed, Reese, Lee and Kittle appealed to U.S. audiences, while Gasly, Russo, Martinelli and Davies hit various parts of Europe and South America 

“The campaign was truly global,” Howe said. “The thing that I’m most proud of, and why I think this campaign did well, is it’s a true diversity of…really unexpected voices.”

While Rebel was going for unexpected, it still vetted the athletes by having them play the game to get a feel for their reactions before shooting. It also kept the script loose to give each athlete room to lean into their personalities, big or small.

“My biggest piece of learning is that you need a good blend of really engaged, charismatic talent that can act and a blend of people that have a really large following,” Howe said, adding that campaigns often rely too heavily on the latter. “Going forward, that’s a lesson we’re going to push for when we work with clients. You may not know this person that well, but trust us — their moment is coming.”

Howe stated that Reese drew the highest engagement of all the participating athletes.

Rebel shot the spot in around three weeks. Howe declined to disclose the campaign’s budget for publication but did state that the firm surpassed its campaign goals in terms of return on investment.