A24 Made a Role-Playing Board Game to Promote 'The Green Knight'

By Brendan Menapace

You want to talk about immersive promotional experiences? It doesn’t get much more immersive than a Dungeons & Dragons-style role playing game.

Indie film distributor A24, which we’ve already crowned as promotional royalty (you’ll find this pun hilarious in a second), has released “A Quest For Honor,” a whole roleplaying tabletop game tied in with its upcoming release “The Green Knight.”

This is the same movie company that recreated the bejeweled Furby for “Uncut Gems,” “Ladybird for President” posters for “Ladybird,” and a grooming kit complete with carved mermaid for “The Lighthouse.” So it goes without saying that they know how to cleverly tie in promotional items with a film’s theme.

We’re not sure exactly how the game works, or even what the movie is about. But, when we saw the first reveal trailer we had plenty of conversations in the office about how awesome it looks. We can tell you that the game includes a “map of the realm,” character sheets for five playable characters (Hunter, Knight, Sorcerer, Bard and Noble) and (of course) a 20-sided die, so chance will play a big role in this game.

A24 even produced a retro-looking commercial for the game.

Second only to seeing @TheGreenKnight in theaters: playing The Green Knight RPG at home. pic.twitter.com/6IaRqc8BAn

— A24 (@A24) July 15, 2020

It looks like the Green Knight is the bad guy? Still don’t fully get what it’s about, but did you see that shot of Dev Patel from the movie? Looks awesome. I’m definitely going to see it.

From a promotional standpoint, this is just great marketing. Even if the movie flops, if the game is fun, it’s something people will keep playing and could even help boost the reputation of the movie’s brand. And at a time right now where people are staying home more, a board game like this is a smart move from A24. Being a paper-and-pencil game, it’s even the kind of thing people can play over Zoom.

Board games and activities like this have been coming back a little lately. Puzzles have been big within that category, too, with McDonald’s and Heinz creating puzzles as ads. And Busch Light even incorporated a puzzle into a promotional contest, where you have to at least open it and dig around for a certain puzzle piece, thereby forcing people to engage with the ad.

The more that you can get end-users to interact with a promotional item, the stronger the brand visibility and tie will be. You don’t have to necessarily make an in-depth board game like A24 did, but it’s a lesson that creativity pays off with end-users.