Doritos and Microsoft have teamed up to promote their brands through a contest on Xbox Live, offering players a chance to submit their own hard work, dreams, and efforts to their corporate masters for little more than the chance to win a contest. It’s called Unlock Xbox, and it runs today through October 4th.
“We are always looking for new ways to connect with fans and give them unique opportunities to express their creativity in a way only Doritos and our partners can deliver,” said Ann Mukherjee of Frito-Lay, in a statement that made my skin crawl with a thousand outraged artistic sensibilities.
The end result will be ten semi-finalists, voted on by Xbox players, and plastered up and down with branding from Doritos, Microsoft, and whatever other corporate partners attach themselves to the contest.
You can read the whole press release here. Bring along some strong drink, you’ll need to wash the taste from your mouth after.
This isn’t the first time this same contest has occurred. The result was a free X-Box Live Arcade game called Doritos’ Dash of Destruction. The branding was… not that intrusive, I think, but oh well.