You'd be forgiven for not knowing who DDA is. The PR firm has several decades of experience in our sister industries, but is new to gaming.
Founded in 1970 in London, DDA specializes in TV and film PR and employs over 150 people at its headquarters and two additional offices in New York and Los Angeles.
And earlier this year, the firm launched its foray into games, hiring Media Molecule and Bandai Namco alumna Gemma Cooper as director of games.
The company also hired Julie La'Bassiere as its new chief strategy officer in April. La'Bassiere is vice-chairman of BAFTA, having previously been managing director of its New York branch. She previously worked for companies such as Tribeca, Obscured Pictures and Apple TV in a career spanning more than 25 years.
The convergence of film and gaming has taken a serious turn in recent years, thanks to the success of adaptations including the Mario and Sonic movies, The Last of Us and Fallout TV series (the latter of which DDA handled PR), and more. Initiatives like Amazon's upcoming anthology series Secret Level are also an exciting sign that these worlds are merging, with the series adapting popular gaming IPs as standalone stories from the creators of Love, Death & Robots.
It is these increasingly open ways of communication between film, television and games that led DDA to want to enter the industry.
“From the very beginning, before my time, DDA was working on movie franchises that were based on games that nobody had really thought about,” says La'Bassiere. GamesIndustry.biz. “Now we're thinking about convergence, but convergence was about Silent Hill, Max Payne, Hitman and Resident Evil, which were the films we've worked on in our history. [But we were] not necessarily thinking about, 'Maybe we'll get to play one day.' But I think it was a start.”
As the years went by and “this convergence happened,” La'Bassiere continues, DDA just organically ended up working on an increasing number of games-related projects.
“Our job is to make sure we're expanding what our clients want in the audience — we're seeing the audience change. So someone who's a movie buff and a movie purist can also be a gamer, can also watch a series.” like Fallout All that stuff, that silo that used to be film and TV and games… the walls are very thin and they're not really walls anymore,” he smiles.
“So we move between each of them. And I think [at] DDA, because we want to be there for the cultural moments that are happening, we want to make sure that we're amplifying for our clients what the cultural moments are, [so] the games just make sense. It wasn't something that was calculated, like, 'This is the natural progression of what we should be doing'.”
Since DDA didn't necessarily have gaming expertise of its own, this is where Cooper's role comes into play, becoming a bridge between the two worlds.
“For all our industries to grow and expand, to be sustainable, we need to continue to support the little guys and girls.”
“I was brought in to create this gaming team that doesn't exist,” she tells us. “We have fantastic people on our team who can do social media really well, who do publicity really well and also have contacts in key outlets that games don't always touch. You'll see big articles on Cyberpunk, FIFA, Call of Duty, these really big shiny touted AAA games that always end up in top publications, but other than that it's hard to break into unless you're one of those multi-million dollar Rockstar GTA .
“So what I would like to do and what I have ambitions with the team is to give publishers, indie producers, developers or anyone who graciously wants to work with us, the space to move into these areas and get the contacts that DDA has been able to reach over 50 flight.”
DDA is already working with clients that have games or are merging into the gaming space, Cooper notes, such as Netflix and Disney.
“All of these streaming services and clients that we're already working with are naturally going into this gaming space,” Cooper continues. “So we have a two-tiered approach, I guess, which means we already have a really attractive group of clients that we can tap into and support and expand into other areas. But then we can also look and find new people. And the fact that we're a 360-degree agency, should be really appealing to people in the gaming space.
La'Bassiere makes it clear that the DDA is not just looking at AAA names and budgets, but also wants to get involved in the indie space, much like it does in the film space (working with the BFI and the small documentary company Dogwoof , for example).
“We'd love to work with Rockstar, great, but we also really want to work with independent people, because for all of our industries to grow and expand, to be sustainable, we need to continue to support the little guys. and girls and make sure they get as much attention as possible, especially since there's so much creativity coming out of these indie studios.”
“The silo that used to be film and television and games… the walls are very thin and they're not really walls anymore. They're more like curtains.”Julie La'Bassiere
We mention that the DDA is entering the gaming space at a tumultuous time, to which La'Bassiere immediately responds with a smile that “the film and TV space has obviously had the best time in a decade,” hinting at the COVID crisis and the writers' strike that lasted for most of the year 2023.
“Of course I'm joking because I think what we can bring to the games industry is… we get it,” he smiles. “The [film and TV] the industry is still recovering. There are a lot of people who are out of work and a lot of people who don't know what they are going to do. And it is an industry that is in crisis. So I think what we bring [an understanding] to the gaming industry. We know how hard it is.
“But I also think that, like in film and television, there's a huge support for each other [in games]which I find incredible, especially when things aren't great. And from that support is this amazing creativity and pursuit of excellence. And I think the same thing happens in film and television where… Maybe we have to think differently. Maybe we don't need to spend so much money on it. And for me, it's exciting to see DDA getting into the gaming space; not to take anything away from the not-so-great, but from the not-so-great, there are really exciting possibilities.”
We ask La'Bassiere what the gaming industry can learn from its sister industries to help overcome the current crisis.
“It might be uncomfortable now, but it will get better,” he says. “I know it's really hard for someone to hear someone say, 'Don't worry, it will get better.' But in reality it will, and I think you just have to get to the other side. Being open to possibilities, I think that was the lesson I had when DVDs or birth movies came out, cable TV and “How can we watch movies on TV, movies are supposed to be in theaters, it's the death of the industry, people will never go to the movies!” And look where we are now… But like I said, I think out of that darkness and that confusion, if you're just a little bit open, there's so many possibilities and it's going to be better.”
Cooper mentions that many independent studies have emerged on the back of several thousand layoffs that have occurred in gaming over the past two years.
“It's scary for a lot of people right now, but I hope and believe that in the future, the fruits of all these incredible studios and independent producers will lead to something fantastic, especially [as] many AAA games were pushed out [back]. So there will be more niches in the market to accommodate more indies and more launches while we wait for the next Nintendo Switch or wait for the next GTA.”
Looking to the future, Cooper and La'Bassiere believe that the convergence of film, games and television will continue to grow.
“It's going to be less of a curtain, it's going to be completely seamless — and we see that in things like the Vision Pro,” La'Bassiere says, adding that Apple's device could change the way we watch movies and play games, which makes sense. “world without borders”.
“In that world without borders, there are no walls, there are no curtains [that] the technology is now available to very few people, it will happen again, just like when iPhones came out. Then again, I'm old enough to remember CD players… When those things came out they were really expensive and then all of a sudden nothing. So I see a repeat of this borderless experience, and hopefully borderless not only through film, television and games, but borderless in terms of the world. So having access to movies and games made outside the US and UK; films that are made in Africa, in Asia. Without borders in the true sense of the word. That is where I would like this rapprochement to occur.”