Firey blood dragons, unite!
How about a little quickie on branding? Dragon Age: Origins (not sure why Dragon Age didn’t work out on its own) and Guild Wars 2 are two fairly highly anticipated entries in the fantasy-RPG space. So how could they possibly end up with such similar branding? Check it:
Left, Dragon Age package. Right, Guild Wars 2 logo. Everywhere: Firey blood dragons.
I have to say I like the Guild Wars 2 dragon better — the styling is solid, and it actually looks like a 2. Dragon Age obviously had the head start, though. I’m sure none of this was intentional, of course. As a marketer, you want to ensure that you can present a strong brand — a logo or general style that persists in all of your marketing materials — that is immediately identifiable to your fans and potential fans while standing out from the competition. Are Dragon Age and Guild Wars 2 direct competitors? Probably not — they offer different gameplay experiences, and Guild Wars 2 isn’t coming out for a while (Dragon Age, presumably, will be out in December… ?). I’d still be a bit iffy about how similar the imagery is.
We recently (not so recently) went back and changed the Witcher logo at CD Projekt RED for the currently-on-hold The Witcher: Rise of the White Wolf. We felt that the original logo was a bit “me-too” in the fantasy realm, and that it could use a facelift to stand out and really present the console version as a striking new product.
Left, before. Right, after awesomeification.
Does branding impact you at all? Does it bother you when two brands use similar imagery? Am I just a filthy marketing snob for even noticing?
Dragon Age is coming out the first week of November for PC / 360. PS3 version, some time later in the same month.
When I saw the Guild Wars 2 dragon today, I did a double take because of all the Dragon Age assets being shoved at us this past year. Seemed remarkably similar, only slightly different enough for someone who knew BOTH games well to tell them apart. I think the average consumer doesn’t analyze these things on such a detailed level — whatever impact branding has on the masses is there, but subconscious.
I’m sure ArenaNet already had their dragon worked out when BioWare/EA came out going, “Hey! Dragon Age!” and it seemed pointless for them to change it after so much effort. So I think the similarities are coincidental. Unfortunate, though, because I imagine from a marketing standpoint, you don’t want your logo to remind consumers of something ELSE… or as little as possible, since it’s hard being truly original these days without some jerks on the Internet crying things like, “God of War clone!! GRRR” (people have developed a habit of labeling action game “God of War clone”). I mean, it’s not a HUGE deal in this case, since you already stated that Dragon Age and GW2 are not direct competitors, but the similarity is awkward.
If these two logos ran into each other at a cocktail party, their exchange would be rather tense.
Guild Wars !!
I ended up here cause I was wondering if anyone was ranting somewhere about how the guild wars 2 uses a dragon in their logo much like dragon age. And yes, it does bother me just a wee bit. The latter also reminds me of the mortal combat logo.