The Internet is a place where our teen audience’s interests, memes, and inside jokes collide – and where Madden could increase cultural relevance by leaning into an over-the-top, Internet friendly tone. We decided to make the ultimate piece of content by combining things our audience loves most: movies, football, catch phrases, athletes, and celebrities – all with the goal of breaking the Internet and dropping the proverbial mic through the biggest celebration of Madden NFL ever.

This came to life in the form of a five minute-long Bollywood action film spoof, chock full of pop culture references, NFL football stars, Madden NFL competition, and a T-rex.

It was a ridiculously long and over-the-top ode to Madden you couldn’t un-see or look away from.

First, we had to accept the fact that we were not just competing with other video games, but with pop culture as a whole. This meant outshining Kanye+Kim, dishing out thrills that rival the NBA (our audiences’ favorite sport), AND triggering schoolyard conversations to veer toward Madden and away from popular video game titles, like Minecraft.

We did this by creating a long-form Madden-centric celebration, not bite-sized ads.

Our idea kicked off with an epic five minute-long Bollywood action film, hosted on YouTube and featuring our audience’s favorite comedic celebrities (Christopher ‘McLovin’ Mintz-Plasse and Dave Franco), NFL stars (Rob Gronkowski, Antonio Brown, Odell Beckham Jr., Colin Kaepernick and Rex Ryan), and a T-Rex.

In the end, we rose to the #1 spot on #PopularOnYouTube list for two days, effectively breaking the Internet. We set new sales records (#1-selling sports game of 2015), and invited a new generation of players into the Madden madness.

Madden: The Game

• #1-selling sports game of 2015

• #2-selling game of 2015

• Exceeded goal of increasing new user base by 10%

Madden: The Movie

• #1 on the #PopularOnYouTube list for two days (evidence that we broke the Internet for two days)

• Top trending topic on both Twitter and Facebook in the US

• Video views to date: 30MM and counting

• 65% of all YouTube views were organic

• Press: 500+ stories generated