PS3 Ad Tour Offers Free Year of School

Given the popularity of video games on college and university campuses, the targeting of students by advertisers comes as little surprise. However, the lavish rewards offered by a recent PlayStation Canada campaign certainly exceeds expectations. In the past month, Campus Cup 07 has visited 20 different educational institutions across Canada, including Fanshawe College in Ontario and Alberta's University of Calgary. As if the variety of PlayStation-related goods on display was not enough to draw attention--which included Evolution Studios' MotorStorm (PS3), Insomniac's Resistance: Fall of Man (PS3) and Ratchet & Clank: Size Matters (PSP) from High Impact Games--the program also enticed students with an extremely lucrative prize: tuition paid in full for the 2007/2008 school year, along with a PlayStation 3, a PS3 game and a Sony VAIO N-Series notebook. Of course, access to that grand prize proved difficult. First, players had to achieve the fastest lap time in MotorStorm for the day, winning a PSP, three PSP games and an all expenses paid trip to the Campus Cup 07 finals in the process. Then on March 30th and 31st, the 20 finalists will meet up in Toronto and face off in a number of challenges, where only one will emerge victorious. Still, even if the odds of entering the final round were not so good, I doubt many argued with the chance to finance an entire year of school plus a PS3 and a notebook computer off a few quick laps of MotorStorm.