Piaras Kelly PR - Public Relations in Ireland

I haven’t really been able to tell people what I’ve been doing in work recently, I’ve simply been telling people that I’ve been working on some “interesting projects.” One of those projects just happened to be the launch of Halo 3, which we launched last week. Billed as the entertainment event of the year, we captured the imagination of the public by bringing MacGyver to Ireland and setting Master Chief loose on the streets of Dublin.

Why MacGyver? Just like the previous title in the franchise, Halo 3 smashed entertainment box office records with its opening days sales. It is as big as any Hollywood blockbuster, but unlike most movie premieres the star of blockbuster is a video game character. In order to bring the launch to life and grab the attention of the general public rather than just gamers, I came up with the idea of bringing a real life action hero to Ireland to launch the game and top of our list of heroes was Richard Dean Anderson, better known for his roles in MacGyver and Stargate SG:1. More importantly we wanted one pop culture phenomenon to launch another pop culture phenomenon, a passing of the baton of sorts. Never in our wildest dreams did we imagine that it would be such a success. Even EuroGamer thought it was pretty cool.

Excuse the quality of the photo. Somehow I couldn’t manage to find my camera last week, but low and behold it turns up exactly where I had left it this week.

What started out as a wild idea in a brainstorm quickly became a reality, but I could hardly believe it until Richard actually stepped through the sliding doors at arrivals in Dublin airport. What followed was a whirlwind three days that makes it a little bit harder to describe what I do at times. Who else can say when asked what you did at work today reply that you hung out with Richard Dean Anderson. Keeping the fact that I’d played Halo 3 before it was released was hard enough to keep under wraps.

Besides the usual media buildup to the launch we also let Master Chief loose on the streets of Dublin. He was swamped with people looking for photos, but the most amazing reaction was when he appeared at the midnight launch at Gamestop of Grafton Street. Rockstars don’t get as good a reception. Gamestop put on a fantastic show for the 500 odd fans that had turned up that evening with DJs, dancers and the Red Bullcrew whipping them into a frenzy as the clock counted down to midnight. We threw Master Chief into the mix and it just tipped them over the edge.

It was wall-to wall Halo 3 with coverage in the Irish Times, Irish Independent, Irish Examiner, Irish Sun, Irish Daily Star, Irish Daily Star on Sunday, Sunday Independent, Sunday Tribune, Sunday Business Post, Today FM, 2FM, FM104M, NewsTalk, 98FM, Spin 103.8, RTE 2, TV3 and still more to come. This campaign has easily been one of my favourites at Edelman so far. Now to get my hands on Halo 3. And to think I might have become an accountant…

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