Recommended Extra, Warner, Lego Harry Potter, Friday June 4th 2010

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O® OF LEG 1-4 S IE P O FIVE C TER™ : YEARS POT HARRY

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ombining two of the best loved family franchises of any era, LEGO® Harry Potter™: Years 1-4 is a unique and truly magical adventure.

It covers the first four books and films in Harry’s journey: Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone™, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets™, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban™ and Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire™.

The result is an incredibly packed game, with an epic sweep of a storyline that’s full to bursting with characters and highlights from Harry’s first four years at Hogwarts™ and beyond.

And, of course, it’s another classic in the acclaimed, awardwinning series of LEGO games, which means it’s a whole new way to experience and enjoy iconic scenes and classic moments from a story that caused a revolution in children’s fiction and became one of the biggest film franchises in Hollywood history.

As you’d expect, players themselves play a part in building the adventure from Privet Drive to the Triwizard Tournament, helping to create an interactive journey that takes them through some of the most detailed and expansive environments ever created for a LEGO game, including Diagon Alley™, the Forbidden Forest, the village of Hogsmeade™ and, of course, Hogwarts castle itself. In fact, LEGO’s 3D, immersive Hogwarts is the most detailed LEGO game location ever created.

Gameplay elements include potion-making, spell-casting, puzzlesolving and magical building. There are over 100 playable characters, from the obvious ones like Harry himself, Ron Weasley™, Hermione Granger™ and Draco Malfoy™, to more obscure fan favourites like Fang, Dobby and Buckbeak.

Of course the game comes from Traveller’s Tales, the brilliant studio behind all the LEGO games to date. And as you’d expect it feature’s the team’s trademark humour, particularly in a collection of hilarious cut scenes.

The scope of the story, the variety of gameplay, the 100+ characters and the extensive, detailed environments, combined with the limitless possibilities created when LEGO meets imagination, all combine to deliver a game that feels fresh yet familiar and delivers an endless of supply of fun, magic and surprises.

C

Covers the first four Harry Potter books and films The best and most extensive use of LEGO gameplay so far from top developer Traveller’s Tales Dozens of iconic environments re-created in classic LEGO style Over 100 playable characters, including Harry, Ron and Hermione Make potions, cast spells, solve puzzles, build with magic Attend lessons, interact with the professors, learn to fly on broomsticks and complete tasks to collect LEGO studs Easy drop-in/drop-out co-op play

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LEGO® Harry Potter™: Years 1-4 Publisher: Warner Bros.

Interactive Entertainment Developer: Traveller’s Tales Formats: Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, DS, PSP, PC

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Re-constructing

HARRY LEGO Harry Potter: Years 1-4 unites one of the biggest family franchises of all time with perhaps the best-loved toy brand ever.

The result is a new, fun and creative take on a classic story packed with iconic characters. Jonathan Smith, head of production at TT Games, and Spencer Crossley, sales and marketing director at WIBIE UK, click all the pieces into place...

How much opportunity is there for players to ‘create’ within the game?

Jonathan Smith: All LEGO games encourage creative play.

You’re free to experiment without penalty, and rewarded for discovery. You’ve always been able to select your personalised team of characters for Free Play, and since LEGO Star Wars II you’ve also been able to customise and create bespoke characters.

In LEGO Harry Potter, you can also build and play in your own levels using the incredibly fun and powerful level builder; and throughout the game, you can use magic to move around and build with LEGO elements to your own design, creating new platforms for progression.

Apart from that creative element, what does making the game in a LEGO style bring to the final product as opposed to just a next gen, ultra realistic rendition?

Does it allow you to be funnier and more irreverent

with what is quite a preciously cherished franchise?

JS: LEGO makes everything fun. From a gameplay point of view, that means that the action is accessible, varied, surprising and rewarding.

With story, setting and characters, it gives us permission to fool around.

A LEGO version of Harry Potter, while still caught up in all the drama and excitement that Harry goes through in the books and movies, finds his life lightened more frequently by silliness. Evil characters are still evil – but they’re undercut with an irreverence which is really appealing to fans.

Will the Wii and DS versions feature very different gameplay elements?

JS: The handheld versions of LEGO Harry Potter have been built by a totally separate team, designed specifically for portable play. They tell the same story, and are similarly filled with characters, magic,

and fun; but have completely different level set ups and controls.

What sort of marketing will you be putting behind the release and where does it rank in your overall lineup for the year?

Spencer Crossley: We’re supporting LEGO Harry Potter with the heavyweight event style launch this incredibly strong title commands. It will be by far our biggest marketing campaign to date and focuses on using visual media, because to see this game is to love it.

Although the reach of the campaign will be broad due to the size of this campaign, our key target audience is kids 6 -12 years old and their parents along with the millions of LEGO and Harry Potter fans. We are partnering with Microsoft on the launch campaign and working closely with the other Warner Bros. divisions including Theatrical, Home Video and

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Consumer Products to maximise the size and reach of our launch.

What’s the reaction been like from the press that have seen it so far?

SC: Following the mantra ‘to play it is to love it,’ press demonstrations have been integral throughout our campaign and we’ve conducted a number of press tours to the TT Games development studios, as well as standalone press events and media publisher visits.

The enthusiasm from all kinds of media, from kids and parenting magazines to hardcore games websites, has been overwhelmingly positive. So much so that we’ve secured a raft of great front covers using some really eye-catching art work and reams of pre-release coverage.

We also have ‘super supporters’ of our LEGO games amongst really high profile media, such as Radio 1’s Jo Whiley, who brought her sons in to Warner Bros. for a gameplay demo and then interviewed one of them live on-air for a full three minutes.

TT Games has an excellent reputation for developing acclaimed LEGO games that appeal to a very wide audience. Many journalists champion TT Games as the darling of the British game development sector and that’s reflected in the enthusiasm for them in editorial content.

Fundamentally, TT Games is a developer that creates great family games and that’s reflected in the press coverage.

Our final push will focus on the Kids and Parenting media through release and into the summer, to keep the game front of mind with both players and gift givers, closely followed by a ‘Christmas in Summer’ media tour of Future Publishing, IPC Magazines, Haymarket, Bauer and Panini to secure the most prominent spots in this year’s Christmas Buying Guides.

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MEDIA

WATCH

DANDY XTREME - “Do you think school is boring? Not at Hogwarts, it’s not!”

MARKETING TV • CINEMA • PRINT • ONLINE • THIRD PARTY PROMOTIONS • TRADE MARKETING

NITRO - “Wizard Power!

Harry’s world gets the LEGO treatment – magic!”

BEANO & BEANO MAX Coverwrap and takeovers of Beano & Beano Max

G TV Warner Bros Interactive Entertainment is running a heavyweight TV campaign starting one week ahead of release (June 25th) and this continues for three weeks across terrestrial and satellite channels (including ITV, Channel 4, Channel 5 and Sky One).

G ONLINE Online activity will reach over eight million consumers in June and July with a mixture of display advertising, integrated micro sites, search activity and CRM.

G CINEMA A fantastic cinema advertising campaign will run all summer across the key blockbuster family films. The box office is predicted to reach a staggering £80 million across these films and will command a family audience of over 20 million admissions.

G THIRD PARTY PROMOTIONS WIBIE has partnered with LEGOland for launch and will be running a number of activities including a great value two for one entry on-pack offer, competitions to annual pass holders and working with Microsoft on a takeover of its Xbox 360 Zone with intensive sampling activity in June and July.

G PRINT There is a a widespread print campaign throughout June and July in kids press. The titles involved have a combined circulation of over 800, 000 and readership of four million.

G TRADE MARKETING LEGO Hogwarts Express will come to life in various forms, at retail, online and at a number of high profile/footfall locations, throughout the summer.

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H

A FIV RR E Y C PO OP TT IE ER S O ™ F :Y L EA EG RS O ® 14

COMPETITION To be in with a chance of winning yourself five copies of LEGO® Harry Potter™: Years 1-4, simply answer the following question:

Which of the following characters does not appear on the front of the LEGO® Harry Potter™: Years 1-4 video game packaging?

A) Harry Potter B) Ron WeasleyTM C) Hermione GrangerTM D) Lord Voldemort

Send your answers to harry@intentmedia.co.uk

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