Cities: Skylines

The new benchmark for the City Building genre, Cities: Skylines was released in March 2015 and took the gaming world by storm. The promotional campaign was heavily focused on the YouTube community, allowing them access to the game and to post gameplay videos in advance of the traditional gaming media.

This tactic, spearheaded by a negotiated exclusive with Yogscast ‘Sips’ who posted the very first “Let’s Play” video anywhere in the world, created an unprecedented level of positive word-of-mouth buzz resulting in Cities: Skylines recording a million sales in its first five weeks on sale.

Crusader Kings II

One of the best selling and critically acclaimed Strategy games of 2012, Crusader Kings II has been a mainstay of the Steam PC download Top Ten chart with a metacritic rating of 83.

With a communication campaign aimed at not only owning the hardcore gaming media space, but introducing the franchise to an audience outside of the traditional Strategy gamer, Crusader Kings II has won numerous plaudits for its ability to tell unique and immersive stories.

Imperator: Rome

The eagerly anticipated Grand Strategy game set during the Roman Empire from Paradox Development Studio (Crusader Kings II, Stellaris), the PR campaign for Imperator: Rome focused primarily on key Strategy influencers along with top tier Specialist Gaming media outlets.

The focal point for the overall campaign was a preview event at the Roman Baths in Bath attended by influencers and media from around the world, resulting in multiple hits of universally positive coverage for the game in the run up to its eventual chart-topping release in April 2019.

Hearts of Iron IV

After seven long years, Hearts of Iron IV was finally released to a wildly expectant audience. Having gradually built its reputation as one of the greatest hardcore strategy franchises in gaming, Hearts of Iron IV was the most accessible game in the series to date while losing none if its depth. Using our extensive media relationships, Johnny Atom managed to secure coverage in outlets that traditionally would not cover such a hardcore strategy game.

Examples included Vice Magazine and The Sun who scored it 4/5 and reflected on its depth and scale by commenting that “you’ll still be playing it at 1am without realising it”.

Night Of The Rabbit

Developed and published by German Adventure Gaming specialists Daedalic Entertainment, The Night of The Rabbit was the first dedicated UK PR campaign for the company, a territory where previously they had very little exposure or recognition. As such, the PR campaign was as much about educating the UK's gaming journalists about Daedalic’s heritage as it was about generating positive coverage for this charming adventure game.
The resulting campaign was by far and away the most successful in the company’s history culminating in 30 reviews across the Specialist Gaming, National and Regional media including 7.5/10 on Destructoid, 7/10 on EDGE online and 4/5 on Games Addict.

Sniper Elite - Nazi Zombie Army

Developed and published by one of the biggest and last remaining independent UK developers, Rebellion, Sniper Elite: Nazi Zombie Army was a standalone game on PC set in the Sniper Elite Universe.

A massive three month global PR campaign targeting Specialist Gaming and Lifestyle media was undertaken and proved highly successful generating huge awareness for this Third/First Person Shooter allowing it to spawn a sequel.

BattleTech

A much loved table-top gaming franchise, BattleTech was the first turn-based tactical Mech PC game in 20 years.

Expectations and excitement from the hardcore BattleTech and PC gaming communities were high, so we worked hard in ensuring that the game was covered by every key gaming website and Influencer in the UK to maximise awareness. This included EDGE, PC Gamer, Eurogamer, Gamespot and Yogscast. In addition, we were successful in generating positive coverage for BattleTech in the gaming sections of more mainstream media outlets including The Metro, The Guardian and BBC Radio 5.

Divinity Original Sin II

The follow-up to the critically acclaimed original game released in 2014, the campaign for this eagerly anticipated sequel focused squarely on Specialist Gaming media and influencers, the core audience for this in-depth and content rich Computer Role Playing Game.

With a current metacritic rating of 93 and surpassing the original in every aspect, Divinity: Original Sin 2 was extensively covered by every key gaming outlet and Influencer in the UK and universally hailed as one of the greatest CRPG’s of all time including review scores of 10/10 from The Metro online, 92% from PC Gamer, 9/10 from EDGE and Eurogamer rating it as ‘Essential’.

Tyranny

The highly anticipated follow-up to Pillars of Eternity, developers Obsidian unleashed isometric RPG Tyranny to an expectant world. Feeding on this anticipation, Johnny Atom delivered a widespread PR campaign across Specialist Gaming and Mainstream media along with a comprehensive influencer campaign.

The critics loved the game with coverage appearing in outlets including The Guardian who said that “Tyranny will leave a lasting legacy on RPG’s” on the way to scoring it 4/5 and Eurogamer who described Tyranny’s depiction of evil as “fascinating and thought-provoking”.

Cities: Skylines PS4 / Xbox One Editions

Hailed as the new benchmark in the City Building genre upon its original PC release in 2015, Cities: Skylines made its much requested debut on console with the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 editions releasing in 2017.

Targeting the Specialist Gaming and Mainstream media, some of whom did not cover the PC release due to being console led, the game lived up to their expectations with Official Xbox Magazine scoring it 8/10 and Metro Game Central saying “the overall experience is pleasingly unique on consoles.”

Surviving Mars

Developed by Haemimont and published by Paradox Interactive, Surviving Mars was an eagerly anticipated city building game released simultaneously on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One (as well as  PC), therefore widening its potential audience outside of the traditional PC strategy outlets.

Age of Wonders - Planetfall

Developed by Triumph Studios, the multi-format Age of Wonders: Planetfall had a high-profile, year long PR campaign encompassing Specialist Gaming, Mainstream and Entertainment media, along with a heavy focus on key influencers, as well as two-session preview event held at the Red Bull Gaming Sphere in Shoreditch, London some 5 months prior to launch.

The Baconing

The third title in the DeathSpank trilogy, the PR campaign for The Baconing was befitting that of a AAA boxed game, covering Lifestyle, Mainstream and Specialist Gaming media across all of Europe.

The end result was an extensive amount of media coverage culminating in well over 100 reviews for this XBLA and PSN release.

JACKBOX PARTY PACK 2

Approached by US publisher Jackbox Games at the eleventh hour, one month prior to the release of their multiplayer party game on Xbox One, PS4, Xbox 360, PS3 and PC, Johnny Atom was tasked with securing as much news and review coverage in the busy Q4 2015 period across all Specialist Gaming, Mainstream and Lifestyle media in the UK.

Regardless of the limited amount of time available to us in the busiest release period of the year, we secured around 30 positive reviews with nothing lower than 7/10 across key Gaming and Mainstream media including 9/10 in the Sun on Sunday and 4/5 in the Independent.

MAGICKA 2

Released on PlayStation 4 and PC in May 2015, Magicka 2 was the MOBA-like sequel to the indie-darling Magicka. The PR and promotional campaign was focused on gameplay coverage featuring up to four games media or YouTubers playing together and publishing the often hilarious results.

As such, the campaign was split-focused between the gaming media, who championed the original game, and YouTubers, the best visual medium for showing how much fun Magicka 2 is played with other players, including a negotiated exclusive with Yogscast ’Sjin’ who posted 10 “Let’s Play” videos in total, each one receiving between 50,000 and 200,000 views.