How about vaccinations in video games?
The players wait for the match to start. Here, in this area, which resembles a spacious waiting room, they run around excitedly, try the controls again. How do you shoot? How do you build a protective wall? Well, everything is in place – only a few seconds, then wild shooting can begin until one person is left and the match wins.
Many battle royale games start like this. For example the most successful of them, “Fortnite”, with a user base of around 400 million. Around 15 million players use this game every day, waiting for their match to begin. How about if you could use this time to stop by an in-game vaccination station? There would be enough space in these virtual rooms.
First of all, the obvious: Of course, no vaccinations could be given in video games. For all the immersion these games promise, this physical interaction is impossible. But online games in particular could actually be ideal for informing and educating people in the wake of a global pandemic. But why is this existing infrastructure hardly used for this?
At the beginning of the pandemic, in early 2020, the situation looked different for a short time. Back then, the main thing was not to leave your own home. It was necessary to isolate oneself. Video games could only benefit from this, of course. Studios around the world have seen an increase in active players, especially in their online games. Many use these games to keep in touch with other people.
Suddenly there were about Plakate with “Stay Home, Safe Lives” in a racing game like “Dirt Rallye 2.0”. In “Candy Crush”, one of the most popular mobile games, Studio King released 230 digital advertising spaces on which the government, in this case the British government, could post information about the coronavirus, which was still new at the time. The fact that many people turned to the games in isolation was used to educate them. Hardly any use was made of this in Germany.
Today we are in a different situation. Certainly, it is particularly important to keep your distance and to stay away from crowds. When asked by some studios, t3n found out that the numbers of many online games are going up again. People are more at home again. But right now the message should actually be: Leave your four walls – one to three times. Depending on how many vaccinations you have already had.
The gigantic online games like “Call of Duty”, “Battlefield” or even “Fortnite” have built networks with which hundreds of millions of people can be reached. And they are also achieved – for example when it comes to in-game advertising intended to encourage people to buy a new weapon. But right now, in an absolutely exceptional situation, this infrastructure could be used to emphatically point out the way out of this pandemic: vaccination.
These can be displays on loading screens, virtual booths where the players can get information. The possibilities are as varied as video games are themselves. It has hardly been used so far. Would the game companies currently cooperate if governments turned to them? That can only be answered if someone takes this first step.
“GTA Online” with a vaccination mission
In Brazil the experiment was on one RPG server in “GTA Online” tried it out directly. These are servers on which rules specially created by gamers apply. In this case, players could get in-game vaccinations to complete a mission and earn a badge. Some influencers have joined the hashtag #InGameVaccine. And even Pfizer worked with an advertising agency to support this campaign. Here, too, the vaccinations were of course only virtual. But the step from an in-game vaccination to a real one may be a little smaller when players experience the importance of this vaccination. Be it the first, second or the booster vaccination.
We could use video games to address people in an environment they are familiar with. In the online worlds, they might be receptive to the call to finally get vaccinated in a different way. Escapism is important and necessary in a time when everything just seems gray and bleak. People can escape this everyday life in online games. Nevertheless, it would be important to point this out to them in a playful way: This pandemic is not a simulation. We can only get out of it when we are really active.
