Ad of the Day: Live Actor Morphs Into CGI Hero in Gaming Spot

180 pitches The Last of Us

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It's a more-than-familiar narrative: At the end of the world, you'll do horrible things to survive. But this new spot from 180 Amsterdam, for the post-apocalyptic PlayStation 3 game The Last of Us, breathes a little new life into the premise.

While the voiceover dips heartily into the clichés of the genre, the visual conceit is powerful. Thanks to some neat effects, a clean-cut—boring-looking, even—live actor transforms into the game's weathered, tortured, machete-wielding CGI protagonist.

That captures the implicit promise of the game: Pick up the controller, and become somebody else—someone stronger and more exciting—for a little while.

In fact, you'll become a hero, as the girl you're traveling with in the game may be the key to curing the human race—an element of the narrative that's oddly not clear in the ad, even though it would bolster the ego play.

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