Biborg's Resident Evil 2 pre-roll let viewers choose Leon or Claire and the story

Tantalise gamers and internauts for the launch of the new Resident Evil 2 by bringing the audience into the heart of the intrigue and letting them choose the story.

A YouTube TrueView ad with end cards proposing choices — follow Leon or Claire and pick what they go through — so viewers play a 1.5-minute story from the game.

Several videos were linked with end cards offering different choices, twisting the conventional use of YouTube end cards; gameplay captured with Capcom let viewers discover RPD from their chosen character's point of view, with paid placements reaching different gamer audiences.

33% of people who watched the ad chose to continue the experience — high for a paid media campaign — and 85% chose to continue to the end, per Biborg UK MD Kais Ali Benali.

For the launch of the Resident Evil 2 remake, Capcom EMEA and UK chose digital agency Biborg, after a pitch process, to design and produce the game's digital campaign — one that brings the audience into the heart of the intrigue and lets them choose the story.

Using YouTube's TrueView format, Biborg linked several videos with end cards that propose different choices to users, letting them select Leon or Claire and decide what they'd like them to go through. It was one of the first multiple-choice TrueView ads in the video game sector, letting users dive into the cult survival horror game and choose their own 1.5-minute story.

The team worked with Capcom to capture gameplay so the experience felt immersive and active, twisting the conventional use of YouTube end cards so viewers followed either Leon or Claire to discover RPD from their selected character's own point of view. Paid placements reached many different types of gamers, inviting the most engaged to go further and discover multiple adventures.

The results, per Biborg UK managing director Kais Ali Benali: 33% of people who watched the ad chose to continue the experience — 'quite high for a paid media campaign' — and 85% chose to continue to the end.

Resident Evil 2 is a game about choices under pressure, so an ad where you choose was a demonstration of the product, not a description.

TrueView's skip button normally ends the ad; here the end card was the hook, converting the format's weakness into participation.

Multiple story branches gave engaged viewers a reason to rewatch and explore, rather than one fixed film.

Real captured gameplay meant every branch advertised the actual product experience.

An ad format's most ignored feature can be the idea: end cards are already buttons, so a horror game's defining mechanic — choices — could be played inside the ad itself.

The campaign ran as one of the first multiple-choice TrueView ads in the video game sector. Capcom's UK and EMEA brand manager Stefano Barolo said the interactive TrueView ads were perfect for depicting the story choices players would make in the game, and Biborg counted the 33% continuation and 85% completion rates as the proof.