Every developer (or at least marketing company) wants the game they’re promoting to have a distinct image — a personality that helps distinguish their title from others in the crowded gaming universe. Gearbox Software would like you to think of Borderlands 2 as a crazy, humorous badass, weapon-packed good time you can have with all your buddies (including your girlfriend).
So how does 2K games go about pushing “crazy badass” in a real-world setting without breaking any laws, or ending up eyeballs deep in lawsuits? By giving English gamers a chance to bungee jump to earn themselves a copy of Borderlands 2. Here’s 2K Games’ UK PR manager Ben Lawrence’s commercial friendly quote on the event:
We want to provide an afternoon of extreme fun and discover just how psycho Borderlands 2 fans can get. A bungee jump is the perfect way to truly test your nerves and we’re excited to bring the insane pleasure of the game into the real world!
Human error aside, bungee jumping is a relatively safe practice, and the bungee crane is said to be “specially designed” with Borderlands 2 in mind, so we can assume when Ben Lawrence speaks about discovering how “psycho Borderlands 2 fans can get” that he’s subtly referencing additional danger layered on top of the actual jump for promotional spectacle such as:
- A 2K Games employee lighting the cord on fire as you jump.
- A pit of: crocodiles, lava, maggots, or spikes awaiting you at the bottom.
- Random cord size per person for a fun, deadly variety of jump depths.
- A nefarious mustached man with an over-sized saw working at the cord while you’re hanging.
- The cord purposefully breaks immediately after you jump but there’s a trampoline at the bottom so it’s all cool.
This is merely speculation of course, but what we do know for certain is that the event is on a first-come first-served basis, and that it takes place between 10am, and 4pm at the Old Truman Brewery, London, on the 23rd of September.
Are you in the area, and planning to make the jump? For the rest of us non-Londoners, would you participate if given the chance?
