Valve's in-house Portal 2 ad the result of "copycat" agency treatments [Update]
Doug Lombardi has revealed Valve chose to make its own Portal 2 commercials after bad experiences with advertising agencies. See the ad for yourself through the break.
“No one knows the product better than the folks who made it,” Lombardi told MCV.
“We’ve had many creative kick-off meetings with agencies over the years, and you’d be shocked by the treatments that have come back. Copycat treatments. Cliché treatments. Treatments that reveal the agency wasn’t listening in the initial meeting."
Portal 2's TV spot was the result of eight weeks' work by Valve staff. In addition to overcoming agency apathy with gaming passion, making its own ads allowed Valve to test and tweak the results.
“With the Portal 2 ad, we playtested it and were able to make changes during production. With an agency, those types of tests are too often left to a post-mortem – at which point, the value of those realisations is pretty close to worthless.”
[Update] See the results of Valve's efforts below. Thanks, Blue.
Thanks, Big Download.
