Gaming app Royal Match has sparked conversation online after social media users noticed the mobile game using multiple high-profile celebrities in its video-on-demand campaigns.
Royal Match, owned by Istanbul parent company Dream Games – which expanded to a London office earlier this year – has been releasing a number of promotional videos featuring an increasingly unlikely series of notable British stars.
Unexpected names seen endorsing Royal Match include Simon Cowell, Amanda Holden, Rylan Clark, Olly Murs, Stacey Solomon, Dermot O’Leary and Tess Daly.
The adverts are showcased on multiple channels, but most prominently free versions of apps, such as Duolingo or other gaming apps.
The celebrities appear alongside a short ‘in-game’ mock graphic that displays the main character of Royal Match, a king, trapped in increasingly implausible predicaments, to be saved only through a ‘match-three’ type gameplay.
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The adverts then progress to show the celebrities in staged everyday scenarios expressing their joy at playing the game, before delivering the call to action to ‘download Royal Match now’.
The move has led to commentators taking to X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, to express their mock shock and confusion that the brand managed to recruit such high-profile stars.
One tweet read ‘Royal Match has captured AJ Odudu’ with multiple crying-face emojis, observing that the gaming app is enlisting an ever-increasing number of celebrities for the adverts.
EVIL EVIL ROYAL MATCH HAS CAPTURED AJ ODUDU 😭😭 at least ar AJ is the best actress, bafta 2024 please pic.twitter.com/PU50WnROIK
— Liam (@liamandrews123) August 28, 2023
Another user questioned how the app was able to afford so many celebrities, with a message that read, ‘We need an investigation into Royal Match. Like what the hell is actually going on with every single celebrity in the UK right now.’
We need an investigation into Royal Match. Like what the hell is actually going on with every single celebrity in the UK right now pic.twitter.com/q4eOF2Eihw
— sᴜᴘᴇʀ ᴛᴠ (@superTV247) August 26, 2023
Earlier this year, The Sun publication reported that Simon Cowell, one of the more prominent celebrities featured in Royal Match’s line-up, had received a seven-figure payout for starring in a mobile app.
It is not the first mobile game to receive attention on social media following a celebrity-clad marketing campaign.
Earlier this year, Merge Mansion, created by Metacore, garnered attention from its marketing video, due to the films’ amusingly detailed storyline – a sharp contrast to actual gameplay – and its use of celebrities such as Pedro Pascal.
Marketing Beat has contacted Dream Games for comment.
