Clash of Clans TV Spot, 'Ride of the Hog Riders: Call in the Cavalry'

iSpot Review - June 18, 2015

Every hog rider has his day in this new Supercell Clash of Clans commercial. Supercell's ads generally feature the game characters engaged in heated, often "creatively" fought, battles. But this time we get the added bonus of learning a bit more about the hog rider, a muscle-bound man with the voice of an angel, and his army of identical warriors.

Shot like a dramatic war epic, we see the hog rider emit a (slightly feminine) battle cry to call his fellows to the field. The other hog riders abandon their previous activities to join the fight.  Stylistic choices like having the hog rider's face appear silhouetted in the sky, triumphant musical scores and a sepia-toned snapshot of the warriors all add to the ridiculously over-the-top epic feel, in a good way.

The best part of the ad is the peeks into the private lives of the other hog riders. Most are engaged in manly activities like arm-wrestling, poker and fixing fences. One is practicing martial arts on the edge of a cliff, in true hero-in-training fashion, and then there's the guy taking a bath with his hog.

The spot is cute and funny, but it's also kind of brilliant. Games like Clash of Clans feature a limited number of characters and as a result your player is the same as thousands of other people. Showing the hog rider characters with different personalities, hobbies and interests - however strange they might be - is a really self-aware way of playing on that.