Dentsu’s SMG Studio announced the release of Moving Out 2, the sequel to its 2020 award-winning couch moving co-op game.
Announced at Gamescom, the world’s largest video and computer game conference, Moving Out 2 SMG Studio is dentsu’s gaming business, which builds and sells direct-to-consumer games across PlayStation, Nintendo, Xbox, and PC.
SMG is also part of dentsu’s gaming division, a global community designed to help brands tap into the gaming ad market.
Through dentsu Gaming, brands can access capabilities spanning strategy and IP development to in-game advertising solutions, commerce and consumer promotion, and AR and VR experiences.
Ashley Ringrose, studio head at SMG Studio, said gaming’s ever-increasing influence on culture, coupled with the promise of the metaverse, has created limitless opportunities for marketers and advertisers.
“Gaming gives brands the opportunity to connect with a truly diverse audience and be part of an experience that people actively seek out.
“The market size and opportunity are huge, with gaming being bigger than TV and film combined. As an example, we released Moving Out in 2020 and the game has already sold over 1 million copies worldwide. It’s designed as a multi-player game, which means the actual audience is at least double this,” he said.
“While our entire team at SMG are gamers at heart, we also know that the world of gaming can be complex to navigate. We’ve integrated our team with a broader community of gaming experts across the dentsu network to help clients fully leverage the opportunity end-to-end for their brand.
“Globally, we have already developed over 17 original games, for brands such as KFC, Footlocker, and Subway,” Ringrose added.
Ashley Ringrose’s Moving Out avatar
According to WARC Guide to Marketing in the Gaming Ecosystem 2020, there are 15 and a half a million people in Australia that play games in some capacities, that is two thirds of the population, and concentrated in cohorts of 25 to 34 and 35 to 44.
Advertising revenue in traditional gaming, gaming & web3, eSports, grew by 8.8 per cent in 2021, according to the PwC Media & Entertainment Outlook 2022.
The segment is expected to maintain strong growth, adding another AU$2.4 billion by 2024, taking total Australian revenue to just over AU$7.3 billion.
Moving Out 2 will take players back to the breakneck, breakback (and ‘break-knee’) world of Smooth Moves’ Furniture Arrangement and Relocation Technicians (F.A.R.Ts), as they pack furniture, technology, and everything including the kitchen sink across increasingly bizarre locales, with increasingly deadly challenges.
Moving Out 2 will see the introduction of online co-operative, cross-play enabled gameplay to the series, allowing F.A.R.Ts around the world to team up and creatively move furniture from point A to point B and beyond.
The game will again feature a cast of bizarre unlockable characters as they traverse different dimensions in the pursuit of seamless and (sometimes) breakage-free home removals, across more than 50 new levels and challenges.
Moving Out 2 will be available on PlayStation®5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, Nintendo SwitchTM, and PC.