VALORANT launched in 2020 as a challenger brand into a sea of first-person shooter (FPS) games, a genre dominated by realistic warfare simulation. In contrast, VALORANT embodies the belief that an FPS can be something more—a game that reflects the modern culture and tastes of Gen Z by letting players express their style, passions, and diversity.

By 2022, all signs pointed to the strategy paying off: VALORANT was regularly on top of Twitch viewership, UGC made by players had racked up billions of views on TikTok, and it hit peak after peak in daily player counts, with nearly 70% of the audience coming from Gen Z.

Then in Q4 2022, two major competitor titles launched—Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II and Overwatch 2. Combined, these two competitors had hundreds of millions of marketing dollars, and for the first time since launch, VALORANT saw growth slow down.

We designed a character-driven creative platform to address the insight that Gen Z players were not finding their real lives and culture reflected in the games they played. For two years, millions of players had spent countless hours with VALORANT Agents in one context: on-duty, fighting to save the world. But, like players, these Agents have entire off-duty lives full of complicated relationships, demands, hobbies, and pursuits.

What do they eat? What music do they listen to? What do they wear? Who are their friends? What are their personal struggles?

In answering these questions, we knew we could connect Agents’ lives outside their missions with players’ experience outside of the game. Instead of selling a feature, we doubled down on storytelling at a depth that would show how Gen Z has shaped these characters, inspiring players to spend more time getting to know Agents as the story continues to evolve.

Gaming is the largest entertainment industry globally. For the Gen Z audience especially, it has become part of mainstream culture and daily life, a medium through which they can form and express their identity.

The problem? Gen Z does not see themselves represented in the games they love. The more we chased this insight, the more we found their tastes and pastimes—which inform the cutting edge of culture—cast aside by the “rinse and repeat” franchise blockbusters shaping the gaming space.

With REVELATION, we aimed to deliver more for players. To reflect their culture back to them by showing VALORANT Agents participating in the kind of real-world activities Gen Z loves most.

The animation style is a mix of 2D and 3D animation with a highly stylized, cinematic approach. The characters are rendered with a high level of detail, using hand-painted textures, while dramatic lighting and camera angles add to the impact of the visuals. The animation is fluid and dynamic, shifting focus between intimate character moments, fast-paced action, and intense combat scenes.

It was a challenge to tell an interconnected story, with many narratives intertwining, in a short amount of time. We used seamless transitions between cuts to connect the scenes together and a montage-style editing approach to set up a conflict between Agents from parallel realities. We wanted the film to be emotional, so we focused on facial expressions and relatable character interactions to build audience empathy and connection.

Overall, the combinations of these techniques helped capture the game’s intense gameplay, while also providing a captivating cinematic and emotional experience.

REVELATION drove meaningful player engagement and recovery and helped boost our growth in Q1:

•In the 7 days following release, player Daily Active Users (DAU) and game hours reverse the previous 3 months’ worth of declines seen from competitive releases.

•Shortly after, VALORANT achieved its highest-ever single day DAU and total spend

It made a global impact with Gen Z and gaming culture:

•REVELATION peaked as the #3 trending video worldwide on YouTube.

•The day after REVELATION’s launch, VALORANT was the #1 viewed game on Twitch globally, with 550K peak viewers.

We created a song consumed by players and non-gamers alike, establishing VALORANT as a legitimate force in music:

•The custom song, VISIONS (feat. eaJ), became the most-listened VALORANT song, with players streaming it over 7M times in 30 days.

•VALORANT conversation in Asia lifted by 10% due to eaJ partnership.