New Mass Effect 3 Marketing Campaign Pressures UK Government For UFO Information

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We’ve talked about some pretty stupid marketing campaigns here at TFTS, but this one definitely takes the cake. With Mass Effect 3 just a couple of weeks away, it’s time for BioWare and Electronic Arts to really start upping the ante on the marketing. How are they doing this? By petitioning the UK government to release information on UFOs and extraterrestrial life.

Yes, the sound you just heard was me slamming my face against my keyboard in utter embarrassment. I’m not going to cover the reasons why there isn’t a government conspiracy to cover up visits from extra-terrestrials here because we’re a blog about gadgets and technology, not a blog about cosmology, biology, or the possibility of organic life elsewhere in the universe. I will, however, say that Electronic Arts and BioWare have definitely left me scratching my head this time around.

I say that because there’s only two conclusions one can logically draw from this ad campaign: either a significant number of the people in EA’s marketing division believe that aliens have visited Earth at some point in the past, or none of them believe it and instead just thought this would be a clever way to tie in to Mass Effect 3′s theme of alien invasion. Both are bad, especially because if it’s the latter, it’s just feeding into all of this nonsense about flying saucers and alien abductions (not to mention it’s a complete waste of the UK government’s time).

One Mass Effect fan actually called BioWare out for this marketing campaign, but when confronted with questions about the campaign, the moderator he was talking to didn’t seem to have any idea what was going on. The moderator even said that this is all a mystery to the folks at BioWare. Is the moderator just playing dumb? Perhaps, but considering that BioWare’s logo is stamped right on the petition page, it seems like BioWare and Electronic Arts are responsible for this whether that moderator wants to admit it or not.

In other news, I am officially ashamed that I’m looking forward to this game. What do you think? Is this a clever marketing campaign for Mass Effect 3, or did BioWare and Electronic Arts miss the mark? Head down to the comments section to let us know what you think!