Anti-smoking Campaign Uses Halo-like Theme

I can't believe they had the character dying after one puff. That is totally unrealistic. Good thing these futuristic video games take place in reality.

Perhaps you folk don't get the message. Smoking kills. If you smoke, you made a pretty idiotic decision.

Does it matter if the government didn't want to pay the extra money for a longer timeslot, better research, and a longer animation? No. The point is carried across just fine.

It's only you folk who get defensive of your destructive habits who take away the wrong message or fail to understand it. It's this thing we call symbolism. That first smoke (and the following smokes from addiction) will most likely be a major contributor to your death. Even an otherwise perfectly healthy individual cannot resist the effects of smoking on the body.

But in the end, we all die. Enjoy your shortened lifespan.

Looks like it would be an alright game though

I wish was as cool as that guy. D:

Hey Guys-

I know the team that put this together. Jason, Rob, and the whole group at Zimmerman are awesome and worked their asses off to bring this together. As to people saying that the spot was funded by a tobacco company- in the interview linked above, they say that the State of Florida paid for it- not a tobacco company.

See- you're just jealous that they came up with a great ad *and* made you want to buy the fake game. It's ok. They're just cool that way.

U Can Always Respawn

This is fake and gay

IMO most gamers don't tend to be smokers, they're in completely different circles. I've spend plenty of time in both circles... what I think is going on here is that the advertisers are assuming that all young people play games which is not true. Someone mentioned targetting the causes like stress and social status... most gamers don't really care about their social appearence (in some cases its based on their frag ratio), and most actually dispise those that are caught up in it, so I really see this ad missing the point.

TF2!  Spy

Makes sense to me. Kids idolize video games so it will probably work!

www.Ultimate-Anonymity.com

I think most anti-smoking campaigns are pretty retarded because people who smoke know it is going to kill them and don't care or just don't want to give it up. I had a ex-gf who smoked and of course she knew it was bad for her and all that jazz but she would always tell me its just too hard to quit, or that its relaxing.

gah, that wasnt dropping dead after the first puff, he was distracted by the ciggarette and got shot in the head by a robot dude was I the only one to realize that?

This was a minor victory.  People in tv-land now have discovered that graphics have moved beyond the 8-bit era. 

Now they just need to figure out that audio and level design have progressed as well.

I really don't get why we need these ads like this. So here's a scenario as to when these ads might work: A teen looks around in the world and discovers a new thing called "smoking". He says, "Gee, I wanna smoke!" But then, just as he's about to buy some cigs at a store, he sees one of these ads and says to himself, "Smoking KILLS you? OMG, I didn't know!"

Seriously. I don't smoke, I don't intend to, but I know we don't need these. Most parents ar responisble enough to tell kids not to smoke, most schools have programs that tell kids to not smoke, drink, or use other drugs, and most people who do smoke already know that it's bad for them. So, for those fools who already don't know: Smoking kills.

Do we really need this? Wasn't MGS4 a anti-smoking ad? I mean, I'm pretty sure in those hour and a half cut scenes, Snake was gagging on smokes for about 30 minutes per cutscene, right? Not to mention in the actual game (all of them from MGS1-MGS4) smoking hurt your health. In this game it slightly boosts your psyche, but lowers your health. That is the perfect ad in my opinion, and it is not intrusive or silly. This ad is silly. You don't instantly die when you smoke.

People are actually more likely to drink and drive and die in a car wreck (which could instantly effect other people) before they kill themselves or others with smoking. I don't smoke, but I'm getting sick of these anti-smoking ads everywhere. I think people can choose if they want to do it or not, and others shouldn't look down on them. It's getting really silly.

This should have had Big Boss and his cigar, that would be infinitely more awesome.

I can understand the importance of educating kids on smoking, espescially since I just lost my grandfather to lung cancer, but I also think that having him drop dead after one puff was a little over the top.  One of the main issues that people keep forgetting in these PSAs is that when you modify or extract the accumulation of time, the message becomes harder to get across.  I really think that they still would've made their point if they just had him cough over... and maybe get whacked by the robot.

For the first week that this commercial was run, it also said, "...which is more people than guns," or something to that effect.  Now the commercial just says that smoking kills 400,000 people a year.  I can see why they changed it, the commercial was practically advocating gun violence.

Yay inneffective add campaigns.

Kids aren't going to see any immediate short term effects of smoking (other than the coughing and being laughed at the first time), which means they will most likely reject the notion that cigs are bad for you.

They'd be better off stating statistics on the % of teenagers that are smoking and the % of those who have favorable opinions of teen smoking (both of which are fairly low). Teenagers are like sheep in this aspect during their respective stages in cognitive development, and it's high time we start using that ;)

My biggest issue with it is that it's a ridiculous misrepresentation of the dangers of smoking. It doesn't teach people anything, it's just fearmongering at it's most basic.

Seriously, when was the last time you saw someone light up a cigarette and immediately keel over dead after the first puff? As someone at the upper end of their chief demographic, I find it a little insulting to my intelligence.

Wow, although the commercial kinda looked cool, the message was still pretty silly. I'm an avid smoker and all for smoker's rights and all that, but I just couldn't suppress a mild giggle.

I'm sorry but if premature babies dancing in a hoedown like manner won't get people to stop smoking then I'm sorry neither will this parody of Halo.

I sort of get the logic that kids might go "Oh no smokingz killed Master Chief!" but I doubt it will do anything. 

Im sorry but smoking .... and video games...

WHY? what have the two got in common? i have ABSOLUTELY no idea why ther are linked. besides isnt this sending out a stupid message? if cigarette illnesses were the same in RL as in a video game then it wouldnt matter because you an just retry. Not so in RL. so.. their message is... dont smoke... OK.. why not put up a screen saying 'dont smoke' would have been a lot quicker and easier.

All this is gonna generate is ridicule and hide the real message. LEVEL COMPLETE *FLASH* *FLASH* *FLASH* , god do they know nothing about video games atall?