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Gaming prizes today often come in the form of skins and loot boxes. Yet before the connected age of gaming, prizes often took more physical forms. Developers would use a range of means and methods to build excitement for new releases. From free consoles to niche merchandise, gaming has been littered with great prizes throughout its history and not all are what you would expect. Below, we discuss three of the most unique prizes in the history of game development.
Starring in a Star Wars Game
It is easy to overlook the appeal of this from a modern standpoint. Customer characterization is a lot more advanced than it used to be. From the start of many games, you’re prompted to design your character however you wish, and it’s a given that most people will design a game character with their likeness.
Yet it was not always that way and back in the nineties, to be in a game was an accolade reserved only for movie and sports stars. It is also easy to overlook the point that up until the early nineties when the Super Star Wars trilogy arrived on the Super Nintendo, Star Wars games just had not been that good and were a far cry from the ones on display today at www.starwars.com/interactive. One had been attempted on the NES, but it failed to give the franchise the game it truly deserved. That made this prize extra special.
Super Star Wars was a great appropriation, using a run and gun come platform aesthetic crammed with scenes and references from ‘A New Hope. It would be followed up by a version of Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, making an appearance in them something highly desirable.
In 1992, during the development of the Empire Strikes Back instalment, a competition was held by Electronic Gaming Monthly. The winner would get their likeness placed in the game itself. The lucky winner was Jeff Crosno, who succeeded by successfully answering a series of multiple-choice questions. His image can be seen on the Hoth ice fields, in a cut scene that shows a group of rebel soldiers.
Journey to the Moon
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Ok, so an actual journey to the moon may still just be a little further into our technological future. But the next best thing is a trip to the place where this could become reality: NASA. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration was set up in 1958 as a way to develop space science. Its greatest achievement was, of course, putting a man on the moon. Since then, it has been instrumental in building the satellite infrastructure that allows our connected world to operate.
A prize offered by iGaming developer Moon-Rocket, this offer is still open for members of their affiliate marketing programs. These are people who promote their offerings, either through websites, social media, or reviews. When people buy because of the affiliate recommendation, the marketer takes a small percentage of the sale.
The prize itself provides the lucky winner with two VIP tickets to the NASA Space Centre in Florida. Two flight tickets and accommodation are included in a two-room hotel suite, along with dinner for two evenings. A tour of the NASA Space Centre shows the history of this groundbreaking organization, placing it in a cultural and historical context. You can view the whole details at moon-rocket.io. While it may not be the SpaceX shuttle and you may not be sitting next to William Shatner, it is the next best thing.
Nintendo 64’s Many Giveaways
When it comes to Nintendo, it is hard to pull any single one of their many prizes out as the victor. The company has used anything and everything to promote its consoles and games. This reached a fever pitch with its advertising campaign for the Nintendo 64 console and its flagship title, Super Mario 64.
The plumber was used in an advertisement for milk, where he chugged the liquid and used it as a power-up. This was part of a sustained Got Milk advertising campaign at the time, which included a whole host of popular culture characters and celebrities. It also had a promotion going with Taco Bell including Mario and his cast.
The franchise’s most audacious marketing strategy was giving away 1.4 million prizes with Kellogg’s Cereal. Named the 1 in 64 competitions, every 1 in 64 boxes held a prize. From games to consoles themselves, it was a huge step that must have blown their marketing budget to pieces. However, despite the console not being hugely successful at the time it now has a cult following. Many of its games can be played on the more modern https://www.nintendo.com, showing it did prove to be a great