“In a first for the Sphere in Las Vegas, the venue’s outer shell (it’s called the Exosphere) will debut an interactive game Thursday, in a partnership with Lego and Disney’s Lucasfilm. The Sphere turned into a Lego brick version of the Death Star, and a full-scale Lego X-Wing next to the building letting visitors (including”, — write: www.hollywoodreporter.com
The Sphere turned into a Lego brick version of the Death Star, and a full-scale Lego X-Wing next to the building letting visitors (including New York Giants quarterback Jaxson Dart) climb in to tackle the iconic trench run from the original Star Wars film.
The activation was connected to the launch of Lego Smart Play, a new platform from the toy company that uses its new Smart Bricks to bring interactivity to its sets. The first Smart Play sets will feature Lego Star Wars theming.
“I think this is going to get people excited, both about Lego as a product launch, as well as about Sphere and the capabilities that we’re doing and unveiling for the first time with Star Wars and Lego,” says Marcus Ellington, executive VP of ad sales and sponsorships for Sphere.
“At its core, Lego Smart Play champions curiosity, imagination, and pushing boundaries. These are values that Sphere embodies as well, albeit at a very different scale,” adds Mike Ilacqua, head of product for Lego Star Wars at the Lego Group. “This experience captures the essence of what the LEGO brand has always stood for: inspiring builders of all ages to create, explore, and push the boundaries of what’s possible.”
The event took place during the Consumer Electronics Show, the largest annual convention in Las Vegas, where tech companies, entertainment companies, and consumer product companies roll out new wares. Sphere has quickly become one of the city’s defining landmarks, both for its programming (which includes concerts and the reimagined Wizard of Oz), and for its Exosphere, which has become an attraction in and of itself.
“What it comes down to is, we have this one of one medium in the Sphere,” Ellington says, noting that visitors to Las Vegas and people on social media proactively seek out and share photos and videos of the Exosphere. “For every single campaign, we measure what was the social engagement around that campaign, what was the social reach, and also what was the relative social reach in terms of how does that campaign perform against similar posts that you’ve done on social.”
Of course, the physical scale of the building makes for a unique proposition for marketers.
“Sphere pushed us to think bigger and more immersively, challenging how Lego Smart Play could blend physical play, digital interaction and cinematic scale. Together, we’re extremely proud of the outcome of what we’ve created together,” Ilacqua adds. “Our interactive experience at Sphere demonstrates how we can elevate storytelling to new heights — quite literally — and inspires us to keep exploring bold, dynamic ways to bring our brand story to life.”
And for Sphere, the Lego experiment will be the first of many interactive experiences that the company hopes its Sphere Studios can develop for the Exosphere.
“This is really only the beginning of what we’re doing. Obviously, we selected Lego as the first of its kind to do this immersive gameplay on the Exosphere,” Ellington says. “Our expectations are that more creative leaders, more CMOs, more brands, are going to see this and want to do their own version of it, or do something completely different. So that’s really the goal and the focus here, and we will continue to drive brand objectives along the way.”