Tomorrow luxury brand Louis Vuitton will launch a game app, “Louis: The Game”, to celebrate the 200th anniversary of the birth of founder Louis Vuitton. The game will follow the journey of the fashion brand’s mascot Vivienne to Paris and feature 30 non-fungible tokens (NFT) to be collected by players along the way, ten of which were designed by digital artist Beeple. The NFTs are collectible but not for sale.
Louis Vuitton was a trunk-maker apprentice that left his hometown at the age of 14 to walk on foot to Paris, where he later founded his world-renowned business. His journey, depicted in the game, is a coming-of-age story that highlights the hardships and adventures of Vuitton to launch the brand.
Despite Louis Vuitton’s CEO Michael Burke being a proclaimed gaming enthusiast (according to the Financial Times) at the age of 64, the game’s theme seems to target younger audiences.
The brand often targets wealthy women from 35 to 54 years old and fashionable young female adults. On the other hand, the layout of the game seems to have been designed to engage and entertain a youthful audience, while the addition of NFTs is likely to attract young and tech-savvy individuals. This contrasts with the planned NFT collection launch of Dolce & Gabbana, which is targeting its core fashion audience.
This is not Louis Vuitton’s first endeavor in the gaming world. The company has been looking to capitalize on the industry, which NewZoo valued at $178 billion in 2020. Louis Vuitton partnered with the League of Legends franchise in 2019 to design some of the game’s characters’ clothing.
The practice is now more common among clothing brands. League of Legends signed a partnership with UNIQLO last year and Burberry has its own game app called B Surf, for example. Burberry also has a partnership with Mythical Games for in-game clothing as NFTs and Gucci is exploring 3D clothing products. Still, Louis Vuitton was one of the first brands to launch such an initiative in the industry.
Meanwhile, Louis Vuitton had previously worked with Beeple on the digital prints for the spring/summer 2019 collection. Beeple auctioned the first fully digital art at Christie’s, which sold for $69 million.
This is Louis Vuitton’s first direct involvement with NFTs. However, in the blockchain realm, the brand’s parent LVMH founded the Aura Blockchain Consortium, which uses blockchain to combat counterfeiting in the luxury industry.
The game may have different names in different regions. For example, the Financial Times called it “200 Anecdotes” but elsewhere it is officially called “Louis: The Game”.
