Quite a few fashion houses have been exploring the possibilities offered by video games in the last 15 years. At the beginning, it was more a fascination with costumes for video game characters (remember Prada's costumes for Shinji Aramaki's mecha anime Appleseed: Ex Machina in 2008?), then video game characters were enlisted for adverts and as inspirations for fashion collections and capsules.
The fashion and video game connection intensified two years ago with Covid-19 and the various lockdowns and, as the years passed, we got to fashion houses creating skins for characters and even branded consoles in limited editions. With 2.7 billion gamers worldwide, it is only natural for fashion houses and brands to look at this industry that represents for them another way to reach out to new consumers.
Gucci has been among the houses actively pursuing the video game path: the house created pieces for The Sims 4 and avatars on the 3D social media app Zepeto (where you can also interactively explore the Gucci Villa space), and also launched The North Face x Gucci designs on the Pokémon Go app.
More recently the fashion house unveiled Gucci Town, a virtual space in Roblox that offers users a variety of experiences, including Gucci-inspired competitions, an exhibition space, a café and a boutique where visitors can purchase digital Gucci items ideal for their Roblox avatars.
But there's more: joining forces with competitive eSport platform FACEIT (that boasts 26 million users), the luxury house recently launched the Gucci Gaming Academy.
The new programme is designed to support up-and-coming gaming talent and their career path. The selected talents will also be offered mentorship through monthly sessions by the academy ambassadors - commentator James Bardolph, pro "Counter-Strike: Global Offensive" (CS: GO) legend Christopher "GeT_RiGhT" Alesund and trailblazer for women in esports Stephanie "missharvey" Harvey.
The first four players for the academy have already been chosen, they are all from Eastern Europe - Polish Lukasz "mwlky" Pachucki (18) and Brajan "DGL" Lemecha (24), Latvian Mārtiņš "shadiyy" Gūtmani (19), and Lithuanian Rokas "EspiranTo" Milasauskas (20).
They were handpicked from Faceit's Pro League (FPL), an in-house league system, but there are future plans for the academy to support more players. The programme will start with "Counter-Strike: Global Offensive" (CS: GO), a multiplayer first-person shooter video game rated Best eSports Game at The Game Awards in 2017, 2019 and 2020.
The Gucci Gaming Academy pledges to support the players for a period of 12 months, unless they get a professional contract with a pro team sooner. In the meantime, when approached by other professional and academy teams, players are free to go.
There are many benefits for the lucky ones: from monthly financial support for as long as they are part of the academy to access to professional coaches, and to top-of-the-line hardware and gaming PCs and monitors from Dell Alienware and personalized selection of computer electronic peripherals from Logitech G.
Besides, the World Health Organization (WHO) will provide expertise and support on health topics to prepare them to the challenges they have to face and sessions with psychologists to deal with performance under stress and being in the spotlight. On top of that they will receive the support of a talent agency and a lawyer to learn more about brand building and legal protection.
If these are the multiple joys of such a programme, there are also some disappointing facts about the academy: while there is a young woman among the ambassadors, all the first four talents are young men. Now, while men outnumber women in video games, and the demographic of "CS:GO" is 92% male, they may have still found a woman to include in the programme.
Another point is the strict focus on eSports, chosen for some obvious reasons. First and foremost there's serious money in eSports as players developing professional careers can make millions; besides, the eSports market is forecast to be worth $1.9 billion within the next five years, according to research firm Valuates.
On top of that, this gaming category was probably chosen also for the fact that it looks "healthier" than other video games (the word "eSports" gives you the impression the people playing them do not spend hundreds of hours in front of a screen which in fact they do...), besides with championships you get the chance to clad your gamers in your brand's clothes and get great exposure (other brands that have dressed players or partnered with eSports include Nike, Armani and Adidas; in 2021 Ralph Lauren signed a deal to outfit esports gaming team G2 Esports), something you may not be able to do with gamers who are into strategic or RPG games and who are probably deemed reclusive nerds verging towards the hikikomori.
eSports seem therefore to have more potential for luxury brands than other types of video games, that's why different companies and brands try to establish links with them (as you may remember, in 2019, Louis Vuitton partnered with League of Legends on a digital capsule collection and a trophy case). That said, if Gucci wants to go for a gaming academy, the house may have to look at a more inclusive type of "institution", even an educational venture to form younger generations and support all sorts of gamers and video game creators as well, avoiding in this way to recreate just the umpteenth cool Gucci gang, another elite of good-looking people perennially clad in the brand's clothes and on its payroll.
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