Ocean Park takes HKers to infinite loop of horror with immersive Halloween campaign

Welcoming back its annual Halloween Festival, Ocean Park has partnered with advertising agency The Bread Digital to unveil an immersive communication campaign brimming with paranormal activity under the theme of haunted school.

This year's Halloween Festival at Ocean Park features a haunted school spanning six zones, namely the Spirit Boarding School, Demon Grove, The House of Wraith Puppet II, Bad Dues, Netherworld and 180 Laboratory, each with a different theme to create an infinite loop that takes people to the heart of horror. Riding on the theme, classic school settings are reinvented and turned into different content materials for digital channels in three phases.

To create an immersive experience, three exploration videos on haunted schools were rolled out as teasers on popular social channels in mid August, including Instagram accounts @jojo_wu, @what7iwatch and @channelchk, aiming to catch the imagination of youngsters. Viewers were taken on a paranormal journey with only a brand tag at the end of the video to create suspense and initial hype around the festival. 

Furthermore, a thematic video was launched the following week on Ocean Park's official page, featuring an abandoned school in real life, where facilities in the school echo those in Ocean Parks' School of Unending Horror. To make the experience even more spine-chilling, the campaign has invited music composer Punk Chan (陳光榮) to create a haunted theme song with chilling ambience and sound effects to spook the viewers. 

Additionally, key visuals of the haunted school have been launched simultaneously across different channels to create the illusion of infinite terror trailing.

As part of the sustainment stage, another video that extended the original main video to an infinite loop of horror that goes on for 44 minutes and 44 seconds, is available on Ocean Park's Facebook. Jump scares and spooky reinventions of Ocean Park's mascots will pop out during the video. A check by MARKETING-INTERACTIVE saw on Facebook that the video has received over 40k views. 

MARKETING-INTERACTIVE has reached out to Ocean Park for more information. 

Franklin Law, marketing director at Ocean Park, said: "With the help of The Bread Digital, Ocean Park's Halloween Fest has transformed into a 360 integrated campaign that reaches a greater audience beyond the park's ground. Combined with a myriad of content, we look forward to welcoming more visitors at Ocean Park." 

Kenneth Wan, company partner at The Bread Digital, said: "We aimed to extend the Halloween experience before you enter Ocean Park to create anticipation. To be frank, my team erupted in both cheers and horror when we found out we were going to develop the campaign. We were creeped out during the shoot and imagined scary incidents, but it turned out smoothly, and everyone was satisfied with all the outcomes." 

Meanwhile, Hang Law, creative partner at The Bread Digital, said the catalyst for our success comes from the client's support and acceptance of our suggestion to augment the idea of the "infinite loop" and presenting it in the interactive form of a gamified video for 44 minutes and 44 seconds. "Viewers are invited to seek out Easter eggs along the way and experience chills running down their spines," he added.

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