Mass Effect 3 promo has bumpy landing

The Mass Effect 3 ‘Space Edition’ promotion launched by Electronic Arts (EA) may have succeeded from a marketing perspective, but it hasn’t exactly been a resounding success for expectant gamers.

Specifically, while weather balloons carrying pre-release copies of the eagerly awaited sci-fi epic have been released over major cities around the world, technical issues and landing-site problems have blunted the event somewhat.

For example, fans tracking one such balloon through the skies above San Francisco were left frustrated after its attached goodies returned to Earth on private property—a hiccup EA is apparently laboring to rectify.

Meanwhile, a couple of lucky Mass Effect fans in Arizona who tracked and retrieved a copy of Mass Effect 3 after the Las Vegas launch came unstuck when they tried to raffle the game off for $5 USD per ticket.

Although their attempt to cash-in wasn’t entirely based on making profit—they wanted to donate 30 percent of the proceeds to games charity Child’s Play—Nevada state law forbids lotteries unless all funds raised are given to charity.

As a result, the raffle was abandoned with any and all cash returned to entrants via PayPal.

Sadly for French gamers, a planned launch in Paris has been cancelled due to regulations that are believed to be beyond EA’s control—which is odd, considering you’d expect such things should have been cleared and approved by the publisher well ahead of time.

Two balloons launched in London appear to have been found—despite problems connected to the tracking service hosted on the official Mass Effect 3: Space Edition website.

One landed in a farmer’s field near Tonbridge, while the other came down in Beacon Wood Country Park near Dartford. Both were located with the assistance of coordinates posted online by EA.