Xbox’s State of Decay 2 is a game set in the zombie apocalypse. But the world is suffering from zombie fatigue. To stand out in a tired genre, the campaign focused on the only part of the apocalypse more dangerous than zombies: other people.

Xbox’s State of Decay 2 is a zombie game. But the world is suffering from serious zombie fatigue. To stand apart, the creative idea focused on the harsh reality of a post-apocalyptic world: what doesn’t kill you, changes you. Survival will cost you everything worth surviving for. Friends, family, hopes, dreams, and ultimately your own morality. With Apocalypse Diaries, we created two films documenting the lives of two survivors undergoing this transformation – Coach and Nurse. While the diaries stand on their own, they also converge to reveal the characters incidentally decide each other’s fates. This was subtle, and by design. Viewers had to piece it together on their own. Which they did, sparking debates about human nature and morality across social platforms.

The challenge was to get gamers excited about State of Decay 2, an indie sequel in an over-saturated genre. The media budget was small, so we needed to ignite buzz to amplify our message. Rather than rely on data, we invited gamers to a co-creation research brainstorm. One child psychologist gently recommended that her group completely wipe out another group to ensure that retaliation was impossible In this session we learned that the really exciting part of this game wasn’t the zombies, but it was the terrible choices one has to make in the struggle to survive and the devastating consequences they’d have to live with.

With Apocalypse Diaries, we set out to make the moral ambiguity of a zombie apocalypse feel real to viewers by portraying the day-by-day lives of two survivors – Coach and Nurse. The characters in each film recorded daily diary entries on scavenged camcorders, giving viewers a gritty and intimate look at how survival changes them over time. To make them worthy of empathy, we turned the intimate “selfie” recording style into a storytelling device. The interlocking storylines were shot in low-light conditions without visual effects. Though they are each compelling on their own, when viewed together the combined arc drives home the zero-sum moral dilemmas of survival, expressed through an oppressive lens consciously absent light, and aided by scored music composition and intensely focused individual performances.

State of Decay 2 quickly became the fastest Xbox game in history to reach 1 million players and achieved the title for best-selling game worldwide in its release window.

Within two weeks, Google search volume jumped 817% overtaking generic “zombies” search term during the paid media campaign window. On YouTube, the Survivor Diaries (Coach and Nurse) averaged triple digit percentage increases shares and views than prior 3-month Xbox averages. In addition, 73% of campaign recognizers said this was a highly anticipated game for them. Recognizers also had a 30-point increase in anticipation.

In the end, we were able to drive purchase intent and record-breaking sales for State of Decay 2, with the sales of the game surpassing their initial sales goal.