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Mr.T Pities Fools Who Doubt World of Warcraft Mohawk
Blizzard have once again called on the marketing power of Mr.T to promote their epic online roleplaying game World of Warcraft in a campaign that is certain to go viral among the internet community.
The first batch of celebrity endorsements of the massively popular fantasy game included Ozzy Osbourne, Jean-Claude Van Damme, William Shatner and Verne “Mini-Me” Troyer. The adverts posted online and aired on TV focused on each celebrity as an appropriate class of player in the game according to their personality.
Unlike Shatner (Tauren Shaman) and Troyer (Gnome Mage) Mr.T was featured in his original advert as a Night Elf Mohawk (a class which does not exist in WoW) after he “hacked the game and created a Mohawk class.” Shortly after the adverts were released, the popularity of the Mr.T online advertising campaign prompted Blizzard to create a Mohawk hairstyle in game for characters who wanted to be more like Mr.T (and who wouldn’t?).
The latest advertising campaign takes Mr.T’s role further into World of Warcraft. Mr.T is back after, “some smack talking fools have been saying that Mr.T can’t change the World of Warcraft.” More pity them.
US servers have been introduced the Mohawk grenade, an item available from a Night Elf Mohawk NPC roaming around the various starting locations in the World of Warcraft. The grenade comes with five charges, capable of changing anyone within its blast radius into, you guessed it, a Night Elf Mohawk.
Blizzard have cleverly got a double bonus from their Mohawk stunt, keeping the 11 million dedicated players entertained with new content and simultaneously attracting new players with viral buzz surrounding Mr.T. The Mohawk Grenade is expected on European servers later this month.
Viral Marketing news posted by Scott Tickner on 19 November 2009
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