HotelF1 launches Road Bands,
a collaborative video game designed by and for its community
a new unique gaming experience 
available on App Store and Android

After the Hellfest Festival interactive website and “Road”, an original music soundtrack, HotelF1 has chosen a new format – the video game – to enrich the brand’s positioning on the theme of road trips, with the aim of attracting an 18 to 34-year-old audience. Backed by Havas Paris, AccorHotels’ French motel chain has just announced the release of Road Bands, a free collaborative video game that can be downloaded from App Store and Android.

The mobile game gives users an unmatched collaborative gaming experience that is unique in that it was designed by and for the brand and its community by making the code available through open source and organizing a 36-hour Hackathon in October.

Thirty developers were given free range with the graphics, game plays and scenarios. The resulting product is a rich universe of graphics (including penned outlines, full 3D, photos, pixel art, etc.), game plays and scoring systems for the first 4 storylines and the 10 new levels which will be updated over the next few months.

Havas Paris Copywriter Kevin Nugeron and Art Director Maxime Trenton explain: "For Road Bands, we came up with a new world and then gave free rein to our passionate community rather than attempting to master all aspects of the game. Co-creation is, in the end, the best example of how consumers can appropriate a brand’s messages.”

An ‘exquisite corpse’ video game
Emerging from a rock festival, glam rock band Slapp Machine decide to go on a road trip to compose a new music album but rival band Zackhøuz have swiped their instruments. Slapp Machine embarks on a wild goose chase crossing crazy mini-levels to retrieve their beloved instruments. The brand coded the basis of the game and invited the HotelF1 community to help write the rest of the story.

Developed by gamers
HotelF1 made the gaming code available on open source via GitHub, a collaborative development platform and organized a hackathon in Paris on October 14th and 15th. Everyone involved, including developers, graphic artists and gamers, could access all graphics, programming scripts and music to give free rein to their creative powers so as to code the remaining levels. The game that emerged is like no other and plunges users into a new video game world that combines fully-developed 3D runners, Guitar Hero, rhythm games, space invaders, platform games (penned outlines, full 3D, photos, pixel art, etc), gameplays and scoring systems.

After weeks of downing gallons of energy drinks, a jury composed of members of Unity, a gaming software, Neo Legend arcade games, Jam Shaker (game jam host) and gaming platform Blacknut, selected the best levels based on game play criteria (design, scenario, visual and technical aspects). The winners saw their level and names added to the game and were rewarded with several gaming-related gifts. If you would like to help code a level, go to github.com/ROADBANDS/GAMEJAM. HotelF1 will regularly add new levels to the game.

Laura Degracia, HotelF1 Digital Marketing Director, added: “Innovation, creativity and teamwork underpin our brand. We wanted to come up with a game that could be designed collaboratively through co-creation, which is something we value particularly, while also retaining fun-packed road trip elements”.

Media timetable:
The game will be launched via the following media timetable:

• MinuteBuzz’s Hero from November 13th to December 7th: a video will be posted on MinuteBuzz’s vertical drop Hero, on Instagram Stories and Hero Snapchat
• Twitch from November 13th to 26th: a 20” Twitch pre-roll
• Mobile campaign from November 13th to December 7th: Mobext during the "Incent Offerwall' Showing
• Melty from November 13th to 19th: a Topsnap on Melty’s Snapchat Discover on the best of gaming, including links to Apple and Android stores

About HotelF1 / AccorHotels
In 1985, AccorHotels changed the face of the French hospitality industry by introducing Formule 1, the first ever budget hotel chain on the market. In 2008, Formule 1 evolved launching new-generation low-cost hotels under the brand HotelF1, which now strives to market its low-cost offering and tap into the brand’s illustrious past and unique locations to serve hotel guests travelling throughout France. AccorHotels is a world travel and lifestyle leader and a digital pioneer providing a new experience at 4,200 hotels, resorts and apartments, as well as at over 10,000 top-of-the-range private apartments around the world.