Netmarble RAVEN2 Launch in Russia: Twitch, YouTube, and VK Ads Campaign for a Dark Fantasy MMORPG
Increase awareness of RAVEN2 among Russian MMORPG players and drive installs during the winter launch window.
1M+ views of RAVEN2 gameplay watched across Twitch and YouTube creators.
2.95% CTR on VK Ads (7x the projected 0.44%)
Background
Netmarble, a South Korean developer and publisher of mobile and cross-platform games, released the dark fantasy MMORPG RAVEN2 in 2025 and commissioned a game marketing campaign across Russia and the CIS. Running on Unreal Engine, it brings the series to personal computers alongside mobile. The game is the official sequel to Raven, a 2015 Netmarble title that reached number one on Korea's App Store and Google Play within days of release. RAVEN2 features a mature, adult-rated narrative and a combat-heavy world, placing it at the hardcore end of the genre.
Russia is one of the largest gaming markets in the region. It has an estimated 106 to 110 million players, and reached around 200 billion rubles in 2025 according to industry studies. Global publishers therefore treat it as a priority when they expand. The MMORPG niche there is also long settled, because veteran titles such as Lineage 2, which still draws more than 40,000 concurrent players, together with Lost Ark and Black Desert, hold a loyal and demanding audience. A newcomer therefore has to win attention inside that established community rather than buy it outright. For that reason, RMAA Agency built a sophisticated marketing solution shaped for a hardcore MMORPG, not a generic launch.
Goal
Netmarble needed a fast build-up of awareness to carry RAVEN2 through its Russian and CIS launch window, which ran from late 2025 into February 2026. The harder part was standing out inside a settled MMORPG community without leaning on generic advertising, because veteran role-playing fans tend to tune out banner-style messaging rather than act on it.
The launch therefore called for a channel mix that could show complex gameplay in depth and turn that interest into traffic to the install pages. RMAA Agency had to find creators the target players already trusted, secure editorial coverage on the gaming portals those players read, and recapture the warmed-up audience through paid social, all under a non-disclosure agreement.
Solution
Audience and market context
Veteran MMORPG players in Russia and CIS judge a new title through other players, watching live gameplay, reading peer reviews, and following community discussion well before they install anything. RMAA Agency therefore built the launch around the places where people aged roughly 20 to 40 look for footage and opinion, which meant live streams on Twitch, video coverage on YouTube, and editorial reviews on the portals the genre reads.
Strategy
RMAA Agency gave each channel a distinct job rather than repeating one message everywhere.
- Twitch carried live, long-form play, where value lies in the loyalty viewers feel toward a familiar host. The roster here mixed two profiles on purpose. Streamers with large, general gaming audiences carried RAVEN2 beyond the genre core, while creators built on difficult, hardcore play matched the game's brutal positioning and spoke to viewers who prize a challenge.
- YouTube handled the considered walkthrough for players who research before they commit. RMAA Agency leaned on genre-native channels here, the MMORPG portals and review formats whose audiences study a game's world, classes, and systems in detail.
- Editorial coverage on Igromania and PlayGround reached the part of the audience that still reads gaming media before choosing a game, a habit that remains common in Russia.
- VK Ads then recaptured attention. Paid social targeted communities built around competing titles, so the message reached people already invested in the genre and pointed them to the install pages.
Campaign execution
The influencer program was the main way to show what the game could do, and it ran in four flights that kept contact frequency high across the launch period.
Flight 1 - pre-registration and early hype (November 2025)
The first flight went wide to build reach and push pre-registration, and it closed at 239,408 views
- PCH3LK1N (565K followers on Twitch) ran a two-hour special stream on the graphics and the character editor for 58,096 views, joined by shevronin (41,107) and nodruga (28,489).
- MMORPG.SU (664K followers on YouTube) published a video guide to the universe and its history (40,792 views)
Zack (154K subscribers on YouTube) broke down the class system (17,682), with further coverage from The Puzzle Tech (1.58M subscribers on YouTube), Evoice Erebus (426K followers on YouTube), INDA GAME (606K followers on YouTube), and other genre creators.
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Flight 2 - launch support (December 2025)
As the game went live, the second flight shifted to holding attention and showing stability, and it added 119,150 views during the critical launch week.
- PCH3LK1N and shevronin (102.6K followers on Twitch) returned with repeat broadcasts that kept the early audience engaged.
- IgrayuSomnevayas (1450 followers on YouTube) joined with a dedicated review.
Flight 3 - winter peak and community engagement (January 2026)
The largest flight lined up with the first major in-game events, such as guild battles, and delivered 666,834 views.
- olyashaa (741K followers on Twitch) led the phase with 239,844 views, 640% of forecast.
- Fasoollka (348K subscribers) (111,018 views) and orkpod (288K followers) (101,223 views) showed high-level PvP and competitive progression.
- Guit88man (181K followers) and vika_karter (251K followers) focused on optimization and cross-platform play.
Flight 4 - retention and longevity (February 2026)
The final flight highlighted the depth of the endgame and brought in 146,488 views, a sign of lasting player interest.
- orkpod and vika_karter ran repeat sessions, while newcomer BrowJey (56K followers) added fresh momentum with 31,640 views.
Alongside the creator flights, Igromania and PlayGround published editorial reviews on their gaming portals. That coverage gave the launch professional validation and drew 69,253 views.
VK Ads campaign
To turn viewers into players, every touchpoint carried a direct path to action, so live broadcasts used chatbot links, pinned comments, and on-screen overlays that sent viewers to the install pages.
The paid layer then worked the regional networks with behavioral targeting. VK Ads reached communities built around competing role-playing titles such as Lineage 2, Black Desert, and Lost Ark, so the message met players already invested in the genre. RMAA Agency ran the campaign in three consecutive weekly stages between December 19 and January 9, shifting delivery toward the creative groups that performed best as each week's data arrived.
- Phase 1 (December 19–23) opened with 375,982 impressions and 7,080 clicks at a 1.88% CTR.
- Phase 2 (December 24–28) scaled to 937,876 impressions and 19,054 clicks at a 2.03% CTR.
- Phase 3 (December 29–January 9) reached 2,370,345 impressions and 82,479 clicks at a 3.48% CTR.
Results
Within the launch window, the channels RMAA Agency ran produced the following:
- Influencer reach: across the four creator flights, videos of RAVEN2 gameplay and coverage gathered more than 1 million views
- Live viewership: the olyashaa stream peaked at 1,985 concurrent viewers, while PCH3LK1N and shevronin held average live audiences of 1,263 and 916.
- Native editorial: reviews on Igromania (39,726 views) and PlayGround (29,527 views) added 69,253 views of independent coverage.
- Performance traffic (VK Ads): the paid funnel drove 108,613 clicks to the install pages from 3,684,203 impressions, and its click-through rate reached 2.95%
