Sometimes, promotional plans sound better in people’s heads than they do in execution. You can have an innocent idea in mind, then watch as you realize it was a horrible, terrible mistake. EA experienced one of these horrors on Halloween, when the Battlefield 1 Twitter account decided to run a #justWWIthings campaign that ended up being disrespectful and offensive. It quickly got out of hand.
The official Battlefield 1 Twitter account was taking gifs from the game, adding stupid catchphrases to them, and making light of the situations represented within them. One tweet read, “Weekend goals. #justWWIthings” and had gif of soldiers using flamethrowers on enemies with a “When you’re too hot for the club.” caption. A second one read, “Your squad got big plans for the weekend? #justWWIthings” with a gif of soldiers with guns in front of a flaming, crashing zeppelin and “When your squad is looking on point.” caption.
An official apology soon followed. The account deleted the prior tweets and put up one saying, “We apologize for any offense taken to content posted earlier. It was not at all our intent to show any lack of respect to the WW1 era.” EA also sent out an official apology for the disrespectful tweets. Which makes more sense, since the actual Battlefield 1 game actually offers a rather tactful and even respectful approach to World War I.