Ubisoft and DDB Paris Turn The Division 2 Into Cinematic Myth
Ubisoft's 'The Drawing – The Division 2' is a single-film advertising campaign created by DDB Paris and published in France in February 2019, designed to build anticipation for the March 15 release of Tom Clancy's The Division 2 by positioning the game as a work of cinematic art rather than a conventional product launch.
The campaign arrived at a precise moment in The Division 2's release calendar. According to Ubisoft, the game's private beta ran from February 7 to 10, 2019, followed by a broader early-access beta period extending through February 11, as reported by Windows Central. An open beta then followed from March 1 to 5, 2019, before the full game launched on March 15. DDB Paris timed the film's release to land inside this beta window, using France as its primary market and the broader European gaming audience as its ambient target.
The campaign consists of a single media asset — a film — making it a concentrated creative bet rather than a multi-format campaign. Its objective was not transactional; there are no price points, no gameplay demonstrations, and no feature lists. Instead, the film positions The Division 2 as a cultural artefact worthy of the same serious attention one might give an auteur film or a prestige television premiere. In the French market, where gaming carries strong cultural legitimacy and where cinema is treated as a national institution, this positioning is strategically coherent. The campaign represents Ubisoft's confidence that The Division 2's aesthetic world — a post-collapse Washington D.C. rendered with near-photographic fidelity — could sustain a purely atmospheric sell. The Clapboard Score for 'The Drawing' is 60 out of 100, reflecting strong creative ambition and notable production craft offset by the limitations of a single-asset, non-performance-oriented release.
DDB Paris identified a strategic tension at the heart of gaming advertising in France. The French gaming market was expanding steadily in 2019, part of a global games market that Newzoo valued at approximately 148.8 billion US dollars with 7.2 percent growth that year, driven partly by lower-than-expected console spending. Console titles like The Division 2 competed directly with live-service games and mobile platforms for audience attention, meaning a straightforward gameplay trailer would have entered an already saturated genre of content.
The insight driving 'The Drawing' is that the most engaged gaming audiences — particularly those who had played the original The Division, which launched in March 2016 — were not looking to be sold a game. They were looking to be reminded of a feeling. The Division franchise is built on a specific emotional register: loneliness, civic collapse, and the strange beauty of an emptied city. DDB Paris recognised that replicating this register in advertising form, rather than summarising it through gameplay footage, would speak more directly to the franchise's existing community while simultaneously attracting an audience that responds to prestige filmmaking.
In the French market, this approach also differentiated Ubisoft from its primary competitors in the shooter and action-RPG space. Activision's Call of Duty franchise, for instance, has historically leaned into high-octane live-action set pieces and celebrity integration, as seen in multiple campaign cycles across Europe. Electronic Arts has similarly favoured spectacle and licensed music for its franchise titles. By contrast, 'The Drawing' offers stillness and craft, a positioning choice that aligns with France's broader cultural appetite for serious visual storytelling.
Nicolas Winding Refn directed 'The Drawing – The Division 2.' Refn is the Danish filmmaker behind Drive, Only God Forgives, and the television series Too Old to Die Young — work characterised by slow-burn tension, hyper-stylised colour grading, and an uncompromising commitment to mood over exposition. His presence behind the camera for a gaming advertisement is not incidental; it is the entire creative argument.
Executive Creative Director Alexander Kalchev and Art Director Jenna Haugmard led the DDB Paris creative team, with copywriting by Julien Kosowski. The film was produced by Stink, with Greg Panteix serving as producer and Jeanne-Marie de la Fontaine as executive producer. Director of Photography Diego Garcia shot the piece, bringing a visual sensibility consistent with Refn's known aesthetic: deliberate framing, extended takes, and light used as a narrative instrument rather than mere illumination.
Post-production was handled by Mikros, a Paris-based visual effects and finishing house with deep roots in French cinema and advertising. Sound production was delivered by Machine London in collaboration with Final Cut, and the score was composed by Julian Winding — Refn's son — whose music has appeared across his father's film and television work, creating a continuity of tone that reinforces the campaign's cinematic coherence. TV production at DDB Paris was overseen by Quentin Moenne Loccoz, with post-production produced by Jérôme Deplatière.
The result is a film that functions as its own object rather than as a trailer. It is structured around a drawing — the title's literal referent — which becomes a metaphor for the game's world-building, its hand-crafted environmental detail, and perhaps for the act of imagining catastrophe itself. Production credits for 'The Drawing – The Division 2' are documented in full across Ads of the World and Clapboard's own archive.
No verified performance data for 'The Drawing – The Division 2' is publicly available. No view counts, engagement rates, earned media valuations, or sales-lift figures attributable specifically to this campaign have been published by Ubisoft, DDB Paris, or any identified trade publication, including Campaign, Ad Age, Adweek, The Drum, or Contagious.
What is verifiable is the campaign's award context. A related Ubisoft campaign titled 'Echoes' received a Bronze Lion in the Digital Craft category at the 2019 Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, according to the festival's publicly available records. While 'The Drawing' and 'Echoes' are distinct works, their shared brand, agency, and release year place them within the same creative programme, suggesting that DDB Paris's approach to The Division 2 earned substantive industry recognition in France's most prestigious advertising award cycle.
Structurally, the campaign's effectiveness rests on its positioning clarity. A single film directed by an internationally recognised auteur, scored by a known composer, and finished by a major post-production house communicates deliberate investment. In the French market, where prestige signals carry particular weight in both cultural and commercial contexts, this level of craft functions as a credibility transfer — from cinema to gaming, and from Refn's reputation to Ubisoft's brand. The absence of a multi-asset rollout may limit reach breadth, but it concentrates creative impact in a way that amplifies memorability for the audiences who do encounter it.
'The Drawing – The Division 2' is a single-film advertising campaign created by DDB Paris for Ubisoft and published in France in February 2019. Directed by Nicolas Winding Refn and produced by Stink, it was designed to build cinematic anticipation for Tom Clancy's The Division 2 ahead of its March 15 launch.
Nicolas Winding Refn directed 'The Drawing – The Division 2.' Refn is the Danish auteur filmmaker known for Drive and Only God Forgives. The film's score was composed by Julian Winding, Refn's son, creating a consistent cinematic tone across the campaign's sound and image.
DDB Paris created 'The Drawing – The Division 2' for Ubisoft. The creative team was led by Executive Creative Director Alexander Kalchev, with Art Director Jenna Haugmard and Copywriter Julien Kosowski. Post-production was handled by Mikros, and sound was produced by Machine London with Final Cut.
A related Ubisoft campaign titled 'Echoes,' produced within the same 2019 DDB Paris programme, received a Bronze Lion in the Digital Craft category at Cannes Lions 2019, according to the festival's records. No specific award for 'The Drawing' itself has been publicly documented in available sources.
'The Drawing – The Division 2' was published in France in February 2019, according to Ads of the World. Its release aligned with The Division 2's private beta period of February 7 to 10, 2019, as reported by Windows Central, positioning the film to reach players during peak anticipation.
Clapboard rates 'The Drawing – The Division 2' at 60 out of 100. The score reflects strong creative ambition and distinguished production craft — including direction by Nicolas Winding Refn and post-production by Mikros — offset by the campaign's single-asset format and the absence of publicly verified performance metrics.
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