Sony PlayStation Buzz! Game Site

Posted on October 30, 2007
Filed Under Banners, Campaigns, Featured Projects, Flash, Ogilvy, Websites | Leave a Comment

Have you ever tried to answer a question on a TV game show faster than the contestants? Then you’re going to really like Buzz!. Time to get your finger on the buzzers…

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Developers: Rich Merwarth, Malcolm Wilson, Frank Young

Round 1 – The challenge
Sony Computer Entertainment of America needed an online site for the Buzz! video game franchise that captured the spirit of social gaming, an increasingly popular genre for them. The franchise has already been hugely successful in international markets and Sony was keen to ensure its success in North America. So, they came to OgilvyOne San Francisco. The Ogilvy West team in SF was asked to concept and develop a site that would include areas for both the Buzz! And Buzz! Junior titles. It also had to provide a solution that could easily be expanded to accommodate future title releases.

Round 2 – The solution
Playing off the unique character of the Buzz! Games, OgilvyOne SF wanted to deliver a striking and eye-catching web experience, rather than just a traditional site that housed content and game information without engaging the user. The resulting concept was a neighborhood that used hand-built models mixed with live action video. Each house represents an individual game title, so as Sony develops more games, each title can ‘move in’ to the virtual neighborhood.

Round 3 – Making it happen
To execute the concept, the team enlisted the help of Figureplant, a San Francisco-based modeling studio, one of whose staff had previously worked on the scale models used for Mr. Rogers Neighborhood.

The 100 square foot neighborhood took three weeks to build from concept to completion. To add an extra sense of realism, all the homes and streetlamps were wired with working lights; depending on what time someone visits the Buzz! site, the neighborhood will change from day to night.

Photographer Jeff Linnell was then drafted in to shoot the model over the course of a week and a half. Jeff also oversaw the filming of video components to be added in the model environments during post production. For example, the intro animation to the site features a sweeping pan over the neighborhood and is a combination of video, stop-motion animation, and various lighting techniques, which further bring the neighborhood to life.

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Developers: Rich Merwarth, Malcolm Wilson

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