Getting in front of the eyeballs of young consumers can often be a hard thing, with the fact that most of them are focused on computers and mobile devices now more that television. One of the simpler and more direct approaches is to simply bring the content to the user – make it easily available on the computer without any preconditions and support the whole thing with sponsorship. Such was the tactic with The Controller: Battlefield 3. We chatted with EA's director of consumer marketing Michael Herst about bringing the series to life.
[a]list: Give us an overview of The Controller.
Michael Herst: We had an interest in doing something unscripted for the competitive, reality TV space. We've done that previous for different games, like with ESPN for Madden Nation for four seasons and we've had the Madden Challenge before. In trying to think of something cool for Battlefield and some of our bigger franchises, what we've discovered is that watching people play the games is not all that interesting. It doesn't translate all that well and isn't what people want to watch. Things that work are conflict and drama and characters; that's always worked on linear television and that worked on Madden Nation. Playing the games was an interesting as part of the show but there were also parts where you discovered personalities and you picked sides or you don't like this one guy but that causes you to tune in anyway.
So we thought, “What's the best way to create quality content?” and we came up with this idea that it would be cool to have a bunch of gamers and non-gamers together for realty television. Wouldn't it be interesting if we got a group of pros together under the auspices of competing with each other, and wouldn't it be interesting to throw that curve ball that the competition is something different, like helping someone who doesn't play games play the game. You'd have to truly work on helping your teammate play. So we figured the twist would move the story along and it would be a fun device for a little while. So that was kind of the thought process: “How could we create something gamers and a regular entertainment audience would think is compelling?” though it was leaning into gamer culture.
[a]list: Something I noticed in the structure of the show; even though the special pro gamer training takes place on a PC, the players are playing on console...
Michael Herst: That had to do with a sponsor. AMD was a partner with GameSpot in the show, so it came in from them. I can't really speak to the specifics of it, but AMD being involved with the show meant that they were associated with the top of the line PC. The idea was the war room, and up until the finale where the pros get to compete with the noobs, but before that that's the only time when the pros could get on a play Battlefield 3. It's not stated explicitly, but it's a pro rig they're working with so naturally AMD would be on it.
[a]list: Did the pros really not know that they wouldn't be the ones playing directly? And did it actually take place over multiple days?
Michael Herst: They were not aware it wouldn't be them. And yes it took place over multiple days. For each day, there was a little bit of shooting.
[a]list: What sort of reception have you gotten to the controller?
Michael Herst: It's gotten a healthy amount of views. It's been a great success and hopefully something we can do again.
[a]list: Has it felt like there's been a definite lift in interest for the series, with Battlefield 3 being as popular as it is?
Michael Herst: Oh certainly. The success of the series is due to the interest in Battlefield. That's one of the reasons we wanted to launch the show with this franchise. It makes sense and it's compelling from the a gameplay perspective.
[a]list: How many people have been watching it?
Michael Herst: I don't have all the stats, but the first episode saw 1.2 million views up to this point, and across all the episodes, it is over 6.5 million views or more. It's done fairly well and GameSpot is the distribution point, focused on their YouTube and website, and from what I've heard they're happy with it too.
[a]list: Besides gamers, who has been the main audience for The Controller? Is it veterans to the series? Fans of unscripted TV?
Michael Herst: I think we’re hoping for a mixture. That's the way it was designed. We're partnering up with GameSpot on the distribution and promotion, they liked the concept and wanted to make it one of their first forays into that sort of content. The idea was to make it work for gamers, but also make it accessible so that other folks would want to tag along and watch.
[a]list: Do you feel like the production values show that web shows can achieve admirable results compared to traditional television?
Michael Herst: Yeah, absolutely! We were trying to make sure this was a quality and a standard you would see on television and part of that is that is Bunim/Murray Productions, our partners on the production side who have done thousands of hours of real world production. They helped create The Real World and they started the whole thing back in the '90s. Partnering with them, and trusting us in things we do and teaching us the things we don't know, went a long way in making this a success for the viewers. And to your point, from a quality standpoint was something we all could be proud of.
[a]list: Do you think it was subconsciously encouraging that everyone, regardless of their background, seemed to like the game and do pretty decently with it?
Michael Herst: Definitely! It was great to see... not trying to sound grandiose... that all sorts of people can learn to play games and that people who like games in general are normal. We hear these stereotypically things around gamers and hopefully what it showed was anyone can game and it's not hard to pick up and people who play can be from all walks of life and you can emulate them. So I felt like it was a level look at what the world of gamers is like.
[a]list: The stereotype seems particularly unfair to pro-gamers, since their attitude, dedication and make up is more akin to pro-athletes than it does to even typical gamer nerds
Michael Herst: Yeah, these people are professionals and they have a craft they work on.
[a]list: Love the inclusion of Freddie Wong in the production. Whose idea was that?
Michael Herst: That was one of the things we wanted to do. It was going to be on YouTube and we wanted to be of that culture and platform so doing something with Freddie was great, because he is one of the biggest personalities on the site and he is a gamer and a fan of gaming in general. So having him participate is something we wanted to see happen. We wanted it to feel right for him and... I hate to say it, but make sense for his “brand.” It wouldn't make sense for him to be a contestant or a host. We wanted to play off his web personality, so he and Brandon are big fans of the game and they collaborated with the Bunim/Murray to grief Johnny in ways that were related to Battlefield, so it makes sense that [the host] would do that and respawn every time. We wanted to acknowledge the community that we know where they're coming from and what they like about the game. And I think the fit made a lot of sense. It felt right for him.
[a]list: Anything you'd like to add?
Michael Herst: We just want to go out with a bang, and we wanted to make sure as many eyes as possible are on the finale!
[a]list: Michael thanks.
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