03.03.11
Cult of EMP Crazy: Computer game publicity results in balloon outrage
One of the leaders of the Cult of Electromagnetic Pulse Crazy was recently in San Francisco as part of a publicity stunt for the new Homefront video game.
The game is a shooter in which the United States is occupied by North Korea.
A publicity item described it earlier in the week:
The event will give fans an exclusive, in-depth look at the speculative fiction fueled by Homefront’s narrative. Scheduled guest speaker Dr. William Forstchen, a published author and leading expert on Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) blasts, will discuss the little known, yet extremely dangerous threat posed by such an attack. Also scheduled to address the crowd is Tae Kim, a foreign relations expert and former CIA Officer who will present Homefront’s fictional timeline and examine how the United States has come to suffer an oppressive occupation by a nuclear armed Greater Korean Republic in the year 2027. The event is scheduled to conclude with a free live performance by The Dillinger Escape Plan, a leading metalcore band.
The year is 2027. Her infrastructure shattered and military in disarray, America has fallen to a savage occupation by the nuclear armed Greater Korean Republic. Abandoned by her former allies, the United States is a bleak landscape of walled towns and abandoned suburbs …
A previous stunt for Homefront — a North Korean-themed lunch truck — has been given the thumbs down by SF locals.
The most recent, a release of 10,000 red balloons — most of which promptly floated into the bay — was given an even more angry reception.
From the San Francisco Chronicle:
A publicity stunt for a new warfare-based video game sent local environmentalists to arms when a mass of balloons carrying advertisements for the game cascaded into San Francisco Bay.
“When I looked out the window and saw thousands of balloons dropping straight into the bay, I was flabbergasted,” said Rod Fujita, a senior oceans scientist for the Environmental Defense Fund. “I never expected to see something like this in San Francisco, where there’s such concern about the bay and pollution.”
The release of the 10,000 ill-fated red balloons came courtesy of THQ, a Southern California video game company in town for the Game Developers Conference at Moscone Center.
Because the game is set in a near-future where the United States is invaded by nuclear-armed troops from North Korea, the company staged a mock lunchtime rally at Yerba Buena Gardens where the game’s supporters, in the words of the company’s news release, “will take to the streets to demonstrate against the North Korean regime and the treatment of its citizens.”
The staged rally was capped by the massive balloon launch, designed, the company said, to “simulate a method used by South Korea to send messages of hope to the North.”
The “messages of hope” carried by these balloons, however, amounted to an exclusive offer from GameStop video game store allowing gamers to “receive the resistance multi-player pack, featuring an exclusive weapon.”
Even that message didn’t get too far. While the balloons at first soared into the leaden gray skies above the city, wind and rain quickly sent thousands of them plunging into the bay, only blocks away.
“They were just dropping right out of the sky into the water,” Fujita said.
Pictures of the balloons bobbing on the bay quickly made their way onto social media sites like Facebook and Flickr, as angry environmentalists blasted the stunt in e-mails and on Twitter.
“Obviously, we have a problem with polluting of the bay and this is just polluting and littering,” said Amy Ricard, a spokeswoman for the environmental group Save the Bay.
“Your balloon campaign was a stupid thing to do to a city surrounded on three sides by water,” one San Francisco resident said in an e-mail to GameStop. “You should be held accountable for the waste.”