Video Game Marketing: Trailers (F.3.A.R. & Crysis 2 Comparison)

I hope it's good, I'm actually interested in this game.

"disturbing imagery, hectic camera cuts, and terror," eh? Sounds like your kind of game, Nick.

I think the better trailer is definitely the one for Crysis. It sets up an atmosphere and gives you a feel for what the game is trying to be like. Whereas, it seems like the F3AR trailer is trying to say, "Hey, fans of our game, LOOK AT HOW FUCKING COOL WE ARE BOOOOM KAPOW" or "HOLY FUCK LOOK AT ALL THIS SHIT IT'S CRAZY AWESOME RIGHT?" That said, the F3AR will, probably, generate more buzz for its game than the Crysis trailer; Sadly, I think people just find that kind of trailer more effective, because most of the people watching these trailers (and indeed, most people in general) will fall for any number of any marketing as long as it involved humor and/or explosions.

But, hey, at least Crysis has "You can't play this game. Its graphics are too intense, and we suck at optimization. So, look at the screenshots, but if you try to play this, your computer (or console) will simply melt from how insane our engine is" going for it.

On the topic of live action trailers; If a game doesn't use live action for the cutscenes, why the hell make a live action trailer? I mean, it's not like you'll see a live action marketing campaign for Toy Story 3. It just seems silly.

That's not to say that the trailers themselves aren't cool, though. That ODST live action trailer was pretty boss.

I hate live action trailers. Its a video game, not a movie. The F.3.A.R. trailer totally turned me off to that game, while im now heavily intrigued by Crysis 2

I my self am definitely more pulled to the Crysis 2 trailer by a huge margin. This coming from a person who found Crysis 1 to be a very poor game, in fact I had all but given up on Crysis 2 and went on a media blackout with it till now and I gotta say this trailer has rekindled my expectations for this game again and made me excited to play it.

As we get to F.E.A.R 3, I don't really know what to think. F.E.A.R 1 was all about (or at least mostly) tension and emotional fear a la Silent Hill, and imo this game is going in a wrong direction and is just turning into every other horror FPS out there. Now I am sure that this trailer doesn't show everything that the game has to offer, and I am sure that the game will have its tense atmospheric moments in it.

If I were to have both game cases put in front of me with a monitor above each playing their trailer and I had to walk out with one. Crysis would have won.

Live action trailers. For certain games I have always been interested in how they would look in real life, and seeing live action sort of satiates that, even though the trailer is generally much poorer in quality than what could have been done with the game engine.

Coming from that I find that when a company chooses to go live action they cant just give a blood filled trailer with explosions and monsters/demons battling marines to a back round of heavy rock, as that really doesn't work in real life, at least that's my opinion, and thus they have to use more atmospheric techniques to satisfy the viewer and can lead to a more full filling game promotion.

TLDR: Crysis 2 > F.E.A.R3 and Live action Trailers are usually horrible but can show a game from a different perspective.

Crysis 2: I love the atmosphere that the trailer brought on with its very soothing music and gradually darkening visuals. The main character looks awesome and the enemy creatures look like things you'll have fun fighting. Its like what the original Gears of War trailer tried to do back in 06 only better executed.
F.3.A.R.: While I have not played any of FEAR 2, I am aware that FEAR is going down the same path as the RE series, switching from all around terrifying to mostly shock horror and heavy action. I do wanna play FEAR 3 because of the intensity that the trailer radiated, but the lack of game play, or in-game graphics, pushes me away a bit.

While on the issue of live action commercials, y'all gotta remember that live action commercials where how things were done back in the mid and late 90s man. Conker on N64 had an almost all live-action commercial but the commercial was so interesting that some people were compelled to buy the game. (Conker commercial +> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJ2kwUboLDQ) Its a similar case for Twisted Metal 2. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=28cTSq97e5Q) So while a live action commercial does seem stupid, it is possible for them to be effective. (Besides who wouldn't wanna buy Legend of Zelda after seeing this commercial? => http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UGAlDGYzI3I)

It's gonna be pretty sad that the first Crysis is gonna look better than the console versions of Crysis 2 lol

Seconding Pencell's comment. That Crysis 2 trailer looked amazing and from what I can tell, it looks like it's all rendered with the in-game engine. i'm excited to see how well they managed to bring the Crytek engine over to consoles considering the few PC's that could run the original Crysis. (I was one of the lucky few who could play it at medium settings with a decent framerate) Crysis' trailer was emotionally gripping with it's contrasting music and imagery.

The F.E.A.R. 3 trailer looks like total dogshit all around. I used to be a big fan of FEAR back when the first was released. I played a lot of the beta and was very active in the budding community of the game. My efforts were rewarded when Vivendi Universal asked me to be a community coordinator for their official forums. Sure it wasn't a payed job and it really didn't mean much outside of my getting inside information on the game and moderating the forums. Still, being part of that community was something that made that first FEAR game something I really cherish. Now, this game seems less about getting into your head with it's scares while putting you into intense gunfights and more about jump scares, explosions, and making everything as bloody as the average 80's slasher film (probably with a likewise story to boot.)

This FEAR3 trailer isn't just disappointing for me, it's just heartbreaking to see. I might play it but I really don't expect this game to generate the same feelings that the first did for me in both it's Single-player and Multi-player components.

I really liked the Crysis 2 trailer most. It reminded me of the old Gears Of War trailer! Those are the kind of trailers you remember after you have seen it, I just watched that F3AR (stupid name) trailer, and I can't even remember it anymore..

As with others, I'm going to have to prefer the Crysis 2 trailer because of how it set up the setting for the game, that being the desperate defense against the alien threat. Unfortunately, the F.3.A.R. trailer seemed a little bit awkward to me. Though I've never experienced any of the other F.E.A.R. games, the screaming and action/craziness did not really get me in touch with what was going on, and it did not interest me because of it.

I don't necessarily hate live-action trailers in general (I really liked that Halo 3: ODST one), but I'm not the biggest fan of them either. If this actually becomes a larger trend in terms of video game marketing, I could see it getting annoying.

From the two trailers, Im more into buying Crysis 2 than F3AR. Like many comment above, the Crysis 2 trailers offers much more to its audience in terms of the actual game than what FEAR 3 does. With its music contrasting the imagery and what looks like the in game engine graphics, Crysis 2 sets to be a promising title because it gives the audience a feel for what the game is going to be like. FEAR 3 really doesn't offer the audience anything in terms of game footage, I think it seems the trailer is focusing more on story development (I assume some new evil appears) and that gun fights might be more frequent.

Whilst it is clear that the Crysis 2 trailer is technically better, I thought I'd play devils advocate and say I prefer the F3AR trailer.

First off, for the most part, these two games are for different audiences, with the 'smarter' gamer tending to choose Crysis, and those more interested in horror and the majority of the gaming public probably choosing F3AR. Because of that, I think they both hit their target audience pretty well, with Crysis no doubt intriguing those who want a different style of war FPS', and assuring the horror fans that F3AR is going to be all about the horror, and bringing in characters from the previous games. At the end of the day, F3AR will probably be a game with a ridicuolous plot, cheap scares and (hopefully) great atompshere, and thats what the trailers about. Also, they obviously don't want to spoil any of the scares, like the (admittely awesome) Project Origin trailers, although they did ruin the endings of both the first and second games.

For all the hints that Crysis won't be a conventional war game, thats still a single guy in a armoured suit, who looks pretty angry at them aliens. It may seem pretty generic for the average gamer.

As for the Live Action trailers, as long as they don't take themselves too seriously, I don't see whats wrong with them. Serious, and beautiful, trailers for serious games, and slightly sillier trailers for slightly sillier games.

I preferred the Crysis trailer for sure.

To be honest, I wasn't happy with the fact that neither one of them showed any gameplay (although I guess that's the point of this blog post in the first place) and so, from a video gamer perspective, neither one served to really inform me about what the game is or how it will play. So, I was forced to view both of them as if they were movie trailers, as the only things I could take away from them were a glimpse of storyline and a glimpse of graphics/visual style. From that perspective, I was just more intrigued by the Crysis trailer. It seems like a better story with a more interesting visual style that would be better suited for my tastes in a game.

It reminds me of the 'Mad World' Gears of War trailer back in the day - I don't now nor have I ever owned a 360, so I never played or watched any GOW gameplay until years after it came out. Had I had a 360 and bought the game based on that trailer, it would've been a largely blind purchase with a big chance at disappointment.

In contrast, the Modern Warfare 2 trailer was a good representation of the game, since that game makes use of set-piece moments within gameplay instead of cutscenes (therefore the trailer could only use gameplay footage). I much preferred that approach to advertising the game.

Ugh, that live action trailer seemed like they were hardly trying, especially compared to that beautiful Crysis 2 trailer

Many people eat up these live action trailers, (especially the ODST one.) But I hate 'em. Its like when you make a video game trailer thats not even made in the same engine. What if I actually want to know what the game looks like?

I for one, prefer the Fear 3 trailer, mostly based cause i liked the Fear games over Crysis, got both fear games on released and loved playing them.

To me i didnt mind the F3AR trailer although the live action surprised me but then again its looking more back to the story than gun fighting. No peeks on what the gameplay will be like but i think its for the best as they shouldn't, as i feel it more of a Hype Trailer as their prolly be another trailer or so in a later date. (showing abit of gameplay)

I think both trailers have their Merits, but F3ars trailer is painting a very different picture than what we will experience. Its painting some B-rated horror movie stuff when the truth is, all the scary parts are going to be very muted in this rendition considering Alma is no longer wanting to kill you.

As for Crysis, I think the hype of it finally coming to consoles will be the major focus of it...and granted the trailer was hypnotizing and certainly motivational, I believe that it will get sales regardless of the great marketing.

As for Live action Trailers.....I see it working in games where its like a war, with faceless enemys.....or faceless allies....but showing a face and expecting the in game model to be the same person.....its very off, like Imagine if Steve Austin was Kratos......sure he would look buff enough, but would it fit?

Fabbit: "If anyone thinks I should shove this here Blade of Olympus up Zeus' ass give me a hell yeah!"

The crysis 2 trailer seems as though it has been hevily influenced by the original "mad world" gears of war trailer. or at least the begining does.

I still think that F.3.A.R is a joke that someone is playing (I know i'm probably wrong)

The Crysis2 trailer had more of an impact on me as a consumer than the F.3.A.R one. The music they chose was beautiful yet haunting and once you saw the environment the game was set in it made you think. The expression on the soldier's face when he was in the helicopter was worth a thousand words since you could see the fear and nerves work its way in. Upon seeing the aliens you know you want to kick their ass and their daunting numbers present the challenge that one would either want to face or avoid. As soon as the antagonist looked back at the end of the trailer you knew he ready to just kick some alien ass.

As for the F.3.A.R trailer, it seemed almost mediocre. The narration was cheesy and off-putting. It seemed like something someone has seen before in some horror movie that wasn't even as scary as one would have expected it to be. To be honest, I almost thought you put up the wrong trailer since it was live-action. If want that kind of scare then I'll go to Halloween Horror Nights thank you very much...

Eh, I'm going to have to disagree with most of the people here. While the Crysis trailer looks pretty I think the "high-octane action while we play pretty music" has been overused since the first Gears of War trailer with Madworld.

While the F.3.A.R. trailer is live-action, I think it did a good job of targeting the group of people who played the first 2 F.E.A.R. games. The quick camera cuts, gore, and shocks are what we expect from the title. While it is getting cliche to have live-action trailers i believe the soft music over hardcore action is far more overused nowadays.

So overall, both good trailers but have to give the edge to F.3.A.R. for better targeting it's audience. Of course, this is all just my opinion.

Fear 3, ugh!! Looks like something even I could've shot (on a $500 budget, no less). Although live action does erk me somewhat, at least the Ghost Recon trailer had some production value in it.

I wonder if as games become more "Hollywood" we should expect to see more of "Hollywood" in games - if that makes sense. More cheese, more gimmicks, more useless mechanics that are only coded in to give the game the Michael Bay look, or the JJ Abrams feel. As a result even trailers for games end up looking like its for a movie. I'd like to think the interactive entertainment industry is able to come up with something more original. The Red Dead Redemption trailers are a fine example.

#1) The Crysis 2 trailer had me enthralled. It was fantastic. F3AR is just, well, boring. Like Nick stated, "Emphasis is placed on disturbing imagery, hectic camera cuts, and terror. It seems that FEAR has become less about tension and more about shock value in each iteration and F3AR looks to be no different."

#2) I think live action trailers, when done properly, are amazing. It's a great way to take a different view of a game rather than just something animated. I don't think this F3AR trailer was all that interesting though. I've seen much better ones, as I'm sure most of you have as well. All in all, I think live action trailers are wonderful, if used and done correctly.