Does Violence and Realism in Shooting Games affect Brand Involvement?

With the release of Riot Games’ new first-person-shooter, Valorant, we analysed brands’ relationships with shooting games. Particularly, the types of partnerships that games with varying levels of gore or realism attract. While some brands see the games as entertainment, others may worry about its connotations to real-life violence, and how it will be perceived by wider audiences.

We see that brands like Marvel, Pringles and even the Red Cross are willing to get involved with games that are deemed "blue-blood" games. These games are contain significantly less gore and have more animated art styles.

In an effort to address these concerns and make Valorant more accessible to distributors and sponsors, Riot Games has implemented a setting that allows players and event organisers to toggle off “show blood”, which will show sparks instead when players are shot. Will the fantasy spells and this added filter be enough for brands?

When searching for entities, you are able to filter events and games to exclude or include a certain game or game category. All games on the platform have genres and PEGI ratings attached to their profiles as an indication of brand safety.

In the future, GEEIQ will be implementing detailed brand safety scores on games, and opportunities related to these games.