“In honor of Friend/Ships Month (February), the Ad Council’s national Seize the Awkward suicide prevention campaign, in partnership with the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention (AFSP) and The Jed Foundation (JED), is launching an exclusive video game partnership with Guild Wars 2, the widely popular massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG). The gaming partnership is the Ad Council’s first-ever integration within a game. During the entirety of February, Guild Wars 2’s 11 million players will receive a free Seize the Awkward t-shirt for their in-game character via the game’s gem store to raise awareness about how friends can help and support one another through hard times. The month-long effort is part of the Ad Council’s ongoing Game for Good initiative, which harnesses the power of leading gaming companies and top gaming influencers to drive awareness and impact on critical social issues.”
Yes, there’s a free, albeit unusual, cosmetic outfit in the cash shop for everyone as part of this promotion. Look under style and scroll down a few ticks. (As I type this, the cash shop database is clearly being slammed by everyone claiming the freebie at once, so have some patience.)
Incidentally, we’re not sure when this went in, but it looks like there’s a little gift icon on the cash shop menu now when you’ve got a freebie awaiting you. The downside is that it didn’t go away when the freebie was claimed, but that might just be an issue with the aforementioned cash shop demand at the moment. So cute, though, the lion has a present for ya.
This year, the Guild Wars 2 community will once again be “invited to share their personal stories of helping one another via the hashtags #SeizetheAwkward and #GW2Friendships,” and “players who share their stories using #GW2FriendShips are also eligible to have their own Guild Wars 2 character put into the game as an NPC (non-player character), forever immortalized in Tyria.”
