T‑Mobile’s VR‑y Cool “Game of Phones” Holiday Campaign Creates Popular “Magentaverse”

If you build it, they will come. Even if the thing you’re building doesn’t exist IRL.

There’s a lot of building happening right now, in fact, thanks in part to the wireless industry’s rollout of 5G — particularly T-Mobile’s. This step-jump in technology is bringing the kind of capability that leads to a new digital frontier known as the “metaverse.”

Defined as a virtual-reality space where users can interact with a computer-generated environment, the metaverse has grown in popularity in recent years with the introduction of Meta’s Oculus Quest headset, which provides a fully immersive experience, and several popular metaverse platforms, such as Decentraland, The Sandbox and Meta’s own Horizon Worlds. Popular gaming platform Roblox is widely reported as the largest virtual world in the metaverse.

T-Mobile’s Senior Leadership team has an annual tradition of marking the holidays by experimenting with new technology. This past December all 17 members took a visible step into this new frontier, appearing in their own “world” as hologram versions of themselves to deliver holiday well-wishes and a bit of fun, celebrating a banner year for T-Mobile — the highest growth year in company history for postpaid accounts, postpaid customers and broadband customers.

By working in partnership with Evercoast, a volumetric capture company, the Un-carrier designed the “Game of Phones” campaign, giving visitors an interactive experience set within T-Mobile’s actual Bellevue, Wash. HQ. As players entered the “Magentaverse,” they were greeted by a hologram version of President and CEO Mike Sievert, who gave directions for how players can navigate the campus. As the game continued, players would uncover additional holograms of top leadership, earning tokens for each correct answer to trivia questions and getting a first-hand look at the cool spaces around the recently renovated campus where employees connect, collaborate and recharge.

The participation in the campaign was just as mind-blowing as the VR gaming experience.

Driven by the company’s executive social handles, the “Game of Phones” campaign saw over 400K people complete the game for a chance at prizes — an astonishing 8,700% increase over the company’s 2021 holiday campaign.

Because the wireless provider is committed to giving back to the community, players were also able to help distribute a $100,000 donation from T-Mobile through the trivia gameplay across three non-profit organizations: Big Brothers Big Sisters of America, National Urban League and Conservation International.

The company has launched and supported several innovation-related programs, some of which include: T-Mobile Accelerator, 5G Open Innovation Lab, T-Mobile Ventures and T-Challenge — and in other areas in the world of VR, such as the 5G-powered VR human cadaver lab for students in pre-med and biology-related majors at Fisk University, in partnership with the top-ranked HBCU, HTC VIVE and VictoryXR.

T-Mobile is excited to lead the charge in building out the future frontiers of VR with its unparalleled 5G network.