As Branding in Asia launches Gaming in Asia, a new editorial hub covering the business of gaming across Asia-Pacific with insights, trends, and analysis for marketers and brands, we sat down with three of the people helping shape the hub: Rey Tiempo, James Bernardo, and Amir Tohid.
The trio first outlined the vision of Gaming in Asia during a session at AdFest earlier this year.
In this conversation, they make the case that gaming is not a media channel but a social infrastructure — one that demands a fundamentally different approach from brands. They break down what lazy marketing looks like inside gaming environments, why the interruption playbook fails in a medium built on participation, and which brands have managed to show up in ways that actually add value.
They also dig into the regional complexity of gaming across Asia, where smartphone-first markets, distinct cultural behaviors, and highly varied player communities mean that a single regional strategy rarely holds. And they examine the role of streamers and creators — why their influence is real, and what separates a partnership that earns trust from one that destroys it.
Your presentation at AdFest earlier this year made a clear distinction: gaming is not a channel, its culture — and more specifically, a social infrastructure. What does that shift in thinking actually demand from brands?
James: I think the shift is in mindset. What most marketers think about are the metrics they are used to. “How many impressions can I get out of this?” is a very narrow view of gaming. The change required is for marketers to think about how their brands can improve the gaming experience for gamers. “Do I give them a boost, a cool skin, or do I reward them with real-world stuff if they reach the top of the leaderboard?” These are some of the questions marketers should ask when entering the gaming world.
The case was made that gamers don’t hate marketing — they hate lazy marketing. What does lazy look like in practice, and where do brands most consistently get it wrong?
James: Lazy marketing happens when brands treat gaming like a digital billboard rather than a living world. It’s the ‘slap-a-logo’ syndrome. Imagine you’re deep in a medieval RPG, fully immersed in the lore, only to see a knight charging into battle, hoisting a banner for Monster Energy.
It doesn’t just feel like an ad; it feels like a glitch in the universe. Contrast that with Resident Evil, where brands don’t just appear but provide utility. They aren’t just seen on the character; they give the character the ‘cool factor’ and the tools needed to survive. That is the shift from breaking the world to building it.
Lazy marketing happens when brands treat gaming like a digital billboard rather than a living world.
Another manifestation of lazy marketing is treating all “gamers” as one demographic. It assumes a League of Legends player wants the same thing as a Wordle player. In reality, these are different “neighborhoods” in the infrastructure with unique languages and values. In visual storytelling, the “gutter” is the space between panels where the reader’s mind does the work. In gaming, the “gutter” is the community conversation on Discord, Reddit, and Twitch.
Lazy brands focus only on the game screen and ignore the massive social ecosystem surrounding it. Last but not least, if a brand integration forces a player to stop what they are doing to watch an unskippable video, it violates the “Player First” rule. Gamers don’t hate ads that reward them; they hate ads that take away their control.
A core problem the discussion covered was that brands still run an interruption playbook inside a medium built on participation. Which brands have made that shift well, and what did they actually do differently?
Rey: If there’s one example I keep going back to when people ask what “doing it right” in Gaming looks like, it’s what Jollibee, a well-loved Filipino brand, did for its GameJoy campaign. Because that shift wasn’t just cosmetic or trying to look cool in design, it wasn’t “let’s hack or trendjack gamers with a silly stunt” or “let’s partner with a title and call it a day.”
GameJoy was going for real participation, because it welcomed gamers in authentically and played around (pun intended) with existing gamer behavior: playing and eating. It actually added value to the gamer ecosystem.
Jollibee asked what is probably the most basic but most important question a brand can ask when entering gaming: “How can we be actually useful to gamers, regardless of what they play?”
The solution of coming up with the first-ever Universal Gamer currency that works across thousands of games, including even those associated with competitor brands, cemented Jollibee’s dedication, shifting from just being an advertiser to a real player and enabler to gamers. It didn’t hack the culture, but instead found its own deliberate purpose. From “look at me, aren’t I clever?” to “I see you, I hear, you, I am here for you.”
Brands have to understand: they are not the main players, but the gamer is. The community is. Lose the traditional marketing and advertising hats that make the community fit our advertising strategy documents. The gamers make the rules, not us.
The GWi data shared during the presentation showed significant variation across Asia — Indonesia and the Philippines look very different from Japan and South Korea. What does that mean for brands trying to build a regional gaming strategy rather than a market-by-market one?
Amir: The variation data across Asia highlights a key point that Asia is not a single gaming market. It is a collection of very different gaming cultures.
For brands, this means that a single standardized regional gaming strategy is unlikely to work effectively. If a brand simply runs the same campaign across Asia, it may fail to align with how people actually play, watch and engage with gaming in different markets.
Asia is not a single gaming market. It is a collection of very different gaming cultures.
Instead, the opportunity is to think of a regional strategy with localized execution. Brands can maintain a common regional platform such as a campaign idea, brand partnership or creative theme while adapting the platforms, creators, game genres and content formats to each market’s gaming culture.
The data suggests that regional success in gaming comes from balancing scale with cultural relevance. Brands need a unifying regional strategy but the execution must reflect the very different ways gaming is experienced across Asia.
Smartphones dominate as the primary gaming device across most Asian markets. How does that constrain or shape what brand integrations are possible?
Amir: It significantly shapes how brands can integrate into gaming experiences. In many countries in the region, gaming is largely mobile-first, meaning that brand activations must be designed for short, accessible, and highly social interactions rather than long, immersive gameplay sessions.
Streamers and creators hold considerable influence over gaming communities — they set the tone, earn player trust, and can make or break how a brand is received. How true is that in Asia, and what does a good creator partnership actually look like?
Rey: It’s still absolutely true in Asia. But the influence only really works when what they’re doing feels like real, recognizable, and authentic (there goes that word again!) gamer behavior.
The moment a brand asks them to suddenly break character, like do a random TikTok dance mid-stream, force an awkward product mention, or pull off a silly stunt that no actual player would ever do, then you lose the community instantly. In that case, streamer and creator influencer marketing in gaming become as in effective as traditional influencer marketing strategies. Gamers can smell that disconnect a mile away.
A good creator partnership in gaming feels genuine when
1. It respects the creator’s expertise, their niche (and there will be a challenge to identify this), their playstyle, and how they relate with their audience
2. When the brand relevance is not forced, and it absolutely makes sense to be there in the first place; there’s a genuine and natural overlap between what the creator does and what the brand stands for.
3. Which is the most important factor: it’s honest. Because at its core, just like in traditional advertising really, influencer and creator marketing only works if the audience believes the person in front of them. And by the way, all of this starts with brands demystifying who their audience really is: gamers aren’t mythical beings with quirky behaviors. They’re just like anybody else: quick to spot what’s silly, and even quicker to call out forced branding. Understanding is key!
Your presentation at AdFest closed with a clear call to treat gaming as long-term business strategy, not a one-off experiment. What advice do you have for brands just getting started engaging with the gaming community?
Rey: call in the reinforcements! Seriously – engage only with groups that specialize in building authentic gaming ecosystems for your brand. One-off outfits calling themselves “gaming agencies” will default to silly stunts, funny activations, esports sponsorships, and other cute, one-off efforts.
But real creative gaming brand builders, the ones who understand long-term gamer behavior and build with it, are the ones who can actually map where your brand should go.
But the easiest advice we can all act on right now? Just play! Join the communities. Understand gamers from their point of view. Engage in the most fun “focused group discussion” you may experience in your marketing career.
Check out Gaming in Asia.
