Beeline has been active in gaming for several years. The brand aims to be a real teammate for its audience: to understand their real problems and create projects based on real insights. One of these insights is about relationships. Gamers are often seen as loners, and gaming as a hobby that harms relationships. But research shows the opposite: couples who play together are twice as satisfied with their relationships (https://mantelligence.com/logitech-g-gaming-couples-survey/) Beeline had already started challenging this stereotype with Love Cup, an esports tournament for couples. It showed that gaming does not harm relationships and can bring people closer.
Problem
After Love Cup, we wanted to take this idea beyond the gaming community and show a wider audience the real stories of couples brought together by gaming. Our task was to find a cultural code — a familiar symbol that a wide audience could easily understand. It would help us tell these stories and change the common view of gamers and relationships.
Solution
We used a romantic tradition that is popular in Russia: couples leave locks on bridges as a symbol of a strong relationship. These locks are usually decorated with romantic symbols, such as hearts, and the couple’s names. The most iconic place for this ritual in Moscow is Luzhkov Bridge. This is where we placed the stories of real gamer couples, mixing a familiar romantic ritual with the cultural codes of gaming. For five couples from Love Cup, we created five custom locks inspired by the games that brought them together: Counter-Strike 2, Dota, Fortnite, Mario and Minecraft. We kept the familiar elements of traditional love locks but reimagined them in the language of gaming: replaced the couples’ names with their gaming nicknames and mixed romantic symbols with recognizable elements from each game. The large locks immediately attracted attention on the bridge. A QR code on each lock led to a landing page where people could read the couple’s real story and see how gaming brought them closer.
Results
We took gamers’ stories beyond their community and made them part of a well-known tradition that a wide audience could understand. 40,000 offline contacts 770,000 impressions 0 ₽ media budget
