Wendy’s launched three branded video games on Giphy’s new digital arcade, “GIPHY Arcade,” making it the first sponsor of the shareable micro-game platform. The branded games, which appear in a section called “Wendy’s World” on the arcade landing page, are nods to arcade favorites such as “Space Invaders” and “Breakout.”
Users can add creative touches to Wendy’s games in the arcade’s “REMIX” section, with the option of adding stickers and mixing and matching characters and music. On the arcade’s desktop version, players can choose from over 30 backgrounds and 20 different songs. Comparatively, the mobile version of the arcade creates a game based on a list of questions that users must answer. Integrated with Snapchat and Instagram, the GIPHY microgames can be shared with friends in messages and social media posts. Games from Wendy’s and NASA are among the first to be featured on the arcade’s home page.
The arcade also features premade games, formats of which are reminiscent of games of the past. Some games that users can play straight away include “Frankenstein Lives,” Big Mouth-inspired “Avoid Lola” and “Galactic Glutton.”
Wendy’s has seamlessly inserted itself into the gaming world through a variety of activations targeted towards gamers. With over 2.5 billion gamers across the world and mobile gaming growing 10.2 percent year-on-year to $68.5 billion, Wendy’s is playing its cards right. Earlier this year, the brand live-steamed its digital avatar on Twitch to promote a Baconfest initiative. Prior to that, Wendy’s launched a Twitch campaign called “Keeping Fortnite Fresh,” which led to a 119 percent increase in mentions of Wendy’s across its social media platforms. More recently, the brand introduced a Wendy’s-themed table-top role-playing game called “Feast of Legends,” available for free in PDF form online.
