Cannes Lions: Entertainment winners 2023 /

Clash of Clans’ fake 40th anniversary campaign won the inaugural Grand Prix in the new Entertainment for Gaming category at Cannes on Tuesday, and also took the Grand Prix in the Entertainment category.

In August 2022, to celebrate the 10-year anniversary of the its Clash of Clans game, developer Supercell decided to try and convince people it was actually turning 40 – resulting in 30 years of made-up history.

Created by agency Wieden + Kennedy, Portland, the campaign went to extreme lengths to make its lies believable, with a 20-minute documentary featuring actors, a fake founder and even a pretend video-game historian.

The work was then supported by three video games inspired by the different eras of the medium – a side-scroller for the 1980s, a racing game for the 1990s and an open-world RPG for the 2000s – all launched within the existing Clash of Clans mobile game.

Beyond the documentary and the video games, Clash of Clans also partnered with three brands to create nostalgic merchandise, including a cereal with General Mills, Cabbage Patch Kids trading cards with Topps, and a line of merchandise with streetwear brand Champion.

The campaign reportedly helped re-engaged lapsed players and inspired a 61% month-over-month increase increase in user-generated content.

The jury president for the Entertainment for Gaming category, Francine Li, who is the global head of marketing of Riot Games, said that it was important to help define the category during its inaugural year: ‘What we were looking for is work that added value to the player experience in creative and innovative ways – making it better to be a player.’

Li added that Clash From The Past was worthy of the top award because ‘it tapped into a universal truth in gaming: Players don’t just love the games, they love the whole universe around them.’

The Entertainment jury president, Brent Anderson, who is global chief creative officer at TBWA\Media Arts Lab said, ‘When you come with really big and ambitious ideas and you take risks – yes it does make your knees knock a little bit in the ideation stage, [but] that risk was important. [That is] the message that we wanted to send as a jury together.’

In the Entertainment for Music category, two Grands Prix were awarded. One went to Apple for its empowering short-film, ‘The Greatest’, which showcased its accessibility tools. The other was awarded to the moving and nail-bitingly intense music video for musician Daniel Kiwanuka’s song Beautiful Life, in which four young people play Russian Roulette at a party.

The jury president of the Entertainment for Music category, Danielle Hinde, who is an executive producer for Doomsday Entertainment, said that they gave Apple’s film the Grand Prix because ‘it was embodying, empowering and celebrating diversity and inclusion, but not in a way that felt exploitative.’ Hinde also praised the use of disabled influencers throughout the process and in the making of the music track, describing it as ‘so infectious.’

In the Entertainment for Sport category, the Grand Prix went to Michelob Ultra and FCB, New York, for their DreamCaster campaign, which saw a blind basketball fan fulfill his lifelong dream of sportscasting a live game for million of people across the US.

The campaign saw the brand transform the action on a basketball court into a language that blind and visually impaired people could interpret through haptic and vibration technology to ‘feel’ the game. The brand claims that for every basketball action, the team created a haptic reaction that varied in pattern, strength and feel. Throughout the process Michelob Ultra worked with Sports journalist Cameron Black, who has been blind since birth, to make this happen.

The Entertainment for Sport jury president, Rob Doubal, who is the co-president and joint chief creative officer for McCann London, said that Michelob Ultra’s DreamCaster campaign ‘was very strong in all categories’, and in particular praised the commitment to inclusion at the core of the idea. ‘The last few years, inclusivity has been the ambition of the work – which is very important – but this piece was the method and actually resulted in a far superior product. Which I think is a really healthy way forward for our industry,’ said Doubal.

Entertainment Gold Lions winners /

Nike FC Presents the Footballverse, for Nike, by Wieden + Kennedy, Portland

Dirty Laundry, for ABAAD Resource Centre for Gender Equality, by Leo Burnett, Beirut

High Valarian Lessons, for Duolingo, by Duolingo, Pittsburgh

Apologize the Rainbow, for Skittles, by DDB Chicago

Entertainment for Gaming Gold Lions winners /

Los Santos +3°C, for Greenpeace, by VMLY&R, São Paulo

Fighting to Remember, for Zikaron Baslon, by McCann, Tel Aviv

FIFA 23 x Ted Lasso, for EA Sports & Apple, by Apple, Cupertino and EA Sports, Redwood City

Entertainment for Music Gold Lions winners /

Cash In, Cash Out, for Pharrell, 21 Savage, Tyler The Creator and I Am Mother, by Electric Theatre Collective

Rosalia Motomami Live Experience on TikTok, for TikTok, by TikTok, São Paulo, Columbia Records, New York and Motomami, Barcelona

Apple Music Super Bowl Half Time Show (Rhianna), for Apple Music, by Apple, Los Angeles

Entertainment for Sport Gold Lions winners /

Lea, for Kimberly Clark, by Ogilvy, São Paulo

The Forgotten Team, for Meo, by Dentsu Creative, Lisbon

Shout  for Telefónica, by VMLY&R, Mexico City