JON MURRAY // creative director + copywriter // ADWEEK Creative 100

HONDA presents R vs R

Racing. It’s in Honda’s blood. From the days of dominating the Isle of Man to Senna’s legendary Formula One career. To launch the racing-inspired Civic Type R, we wanted to build on this motorsport legacy in an innovative way. Since the Type R was simultaneously being released in real life and in Microsoft’s popular racing video game Forza Motorsport 7, we pitted the two versions of the car against each other in a whole new kind of race – a mixed reality race. IndyCar driver Graham Rahal raced in the real Type R against e-sports athlete Peter Jeakins in the virtual Type R.

Clio Bronze - Digital/mobile virtual reality (SPORTS)

One Show Merit - data visualization

Webby Nominee - sports

FWA of the Day

Shorty Awards GOLD - data visualization

SHORTY AWARDS FINALIST - AUGMENTED REALITY

ThinkLA Finalist - INNOVATOR

Addy Silver - BRANDED CONTENT

The race was promoted entirely on social. And each racer got their own followers hyped up and brought them along for the ride with behind the scenes content.

To make the race possible, the real Civic Type R was outfitted with a custom augmented reality windshield. It used data from several sources (Microsoft Forza, Google Earth, and GPS data) and allowed the race car driver to see the gamer’s position on the track at all times.

A week after the race, media on Microsoft’s Xbox platform challenged gamers to download the virtual Type R and beat Rahal’s time.