If permission marketing is an achievement, then getting the audience to spend time playing a marketing game is utopia! The screen shot above is from a new adventure/puzzle game by the Singapore Health Promotion Board (HPB) called Mount Power which is part of their teen outreach on neeteen, a portal for the youth. They must have figured that kids play games, so let's teach them about a healthy lifestyle through an interactive game. The results of this move is yet to be seen.

Games for marketing and education (some people call it advergaming) are a great idea and we will continue to see a lot more of these especially in Asia where the gaming culture is a lot more vibrant. I also believe that we will soon see such games played on the mobile phones and other internet mobile devices.

Another great example from 2007 is the got milk? campaign who created Get the Glass! a very professional adventure game aimed at kids. (Thanks for the link Nov!)

In our viral marketing efforts, we often bang on the people's altruism and willingness to share, but marketing games are teaching us that people's competitive streaks work just as well.