Everton FC sleeve sponsor Angry Birds has teamed up with a trio of Toffees stars to transform Theo Walcott, Gylfi Sigurdsson and Cenk Tosun into personalised playable characters in the new Angry Birds ‘Evolution’.
The initiative was timed to promote the new game version launch and the start of the new 2018/19 Premier League season.
Angry Birds, which is owned by parent gaming company Rovio Entertainment, claims that Walcott, Sigurdsson and Tosun are the first three footballers in the world ever to have their own personalised characters within the game.
In addition to a core launch video,
Everton In Angry Birds Evolution Game from SportQuake on Vimeo.
the activation is also promoted across digital and social platforms both by the sponsor
It's your last day, last chance to get the epic Everton Soccer Stars in #AngryBirdsEvolution! https://t.co/8wmGFjqqLX pic.twitter.com/FIGLOxMd5i
— Angry Birds (@AngryBirds) August 26, 2018
and by the club too.
Introducing the first footballers to feature in @AngryBirds…
Gylfi Sigurdsson, @CenkTosun_ and @TheoWalcott!
Download Angry Birds Evolution now to play https://t.co/XbbnFhdjMG pic.twitter.com/3JcJjF5BM7
— Everton (@Everton) August 22, 2018
Angry Birds, which has been downloaded around four billion times since its 2009 launch, is now in its second year as Everton’s official sleeve sponsor.
Comment:
This is one of the more inventive team/game activations since Angry Birds became Everton FC’s first sleeve sponsor at the start of the 2017 season (see case study).
Rovio also carried out a not too dissimilar activation back in 2012/13 when Angry Birds sponsored the NFL’s Philadelphia Eagles in what was its first ever sports sponsorship.
During that season, the company released a special edition ‘Angry Birds: Philadelphia Eagles’ which included a character Mighty Philadelphia Eagle – this represented Rovio’s first global sports sponsorship.
But in the Eagles deal, none of the team’s players IP were used to create in-game characters.
Links:
Everton FC
https://www.youtube.com/user/OfficialEverton
https://plus.google.com/+Everton/videos
https://www.facebook.com/Everton
https://instagram.com/officialeverton
Rovio / Angry Birds
https://www.youtube.com/user/RovioMobile
https://www.facebook.com/angrybirds
https://www.instagram.com/angrybirdsofficial/
https://twitter.com/angrybirds
