Dubai Tourism and Lego Cube Launch Unique Experience Featuring City's Famous Landmarks

• Gaming application features the emirate’s renowned landmarks in LEGO® CUBE
• Players are invited to discover, build, and learn more about Dubai’s key attractions
• Dubai Tourism continues to explore innovative collaborations to appeal to China, a key source market

Dubai, UAE, 29 October 2019: Dubai’s Department of Tourism and Commerce Marketing (Dubai Tourism) has announced a new partnership with Tencent Games to develop ‘The Map’, featuring Dubai within the successful online game application. LEGO® CUBE is a sandbox game developed and operated by Tencent Games under the license of the LEGO Group, featuring LEGO bricks, mini figures and other iconic LEGO properties. The free-to-download-and-play game offers players an inventive platform to creatively explore and develop Dubai’s famous landmarks in a virtual world on command.  Marking the first time the game has partnered with an oversees partner destination, this unique offering showcases Dubai Tourism’s continued efforts to provide customised, engaging, and interactive campaigns aimed at keeping the city top of mind for Chinese travellers.

The Map, developed and published by Tencent Games, projects the emirate on a virtual platform, allowing players to experience Dubai’s many local and cultural landmarks. As a city renowned for its forward thinking and futuristic programming aimed at offering visitors exceptional experiences, it is an ideal destination to be incorporated into the innovative platform. The interactive Map features some of Dubai’s most celebrated attractions such as Atlantis The Palm, Burj Khalifa, Burj Al Arab, Dubai Frame, Dubai Opera, LEGOLAND Dubai, Palm Jumeirah, Green Planet, La Perle, Ski Dubai, and Al Fahidi Historical Neighbourhood. Players are encouraged to delve into the game to learn more about Dubai’s diverse destination offering, with the added opportunity to build recognisable landmarks with LEGO® CUBE.

Keeping engagement and discovery as a primary characteristic of the game, The Map targets families with children aged 6-16 and LEGO adult enthusiasts. Offering an imaginative, creative and safe digital gaming experience, players can approach the various locations where they can start to build and develop the virtual world of LEGO® CUBE bricks. By clicking “Know More”, the player’s point of interest will display an introduction and photograph of the attraction. Players can also click “Build Now” to become the architects of the city to build the many attractions using LEGO® CUBE bricks. Furthermore, by clicking “Continue to Explore”, players can explore other prominent locations on The Map. As the only international destination showcased on the platform, The Map is set to be top listed as an application during the campaign’s introduction to the Chinese market.

As Dubai continues to enhance itself as a family friendly destination, a series of captivating and heart-warming videos starring two pairs of father and sons have been created by Tencent Games in Dubai, highlighting the importance of spending quality time between a parent and their child. In the video series, one father, Quan Liu– a LEGO geek, along with his young son and a boy named Zongmin Chen– a social media child influencer with 620K followers and his father, go through the journey of discovering Dubai and are able to reconnect and bond with one another through their joint exploration and interactions within the emirate cityscape.

Commenting on the launch of The Map, Issam Kazim, CEO, Dubai Corporation for Tourism and Commerce Marketing (DCTCM) said: “China continues to consolidate its status as one of the city’s top performing source markets, and we remain committed to engaging Chinese outbound tourists through innovative and highly targeted marketing activities to help us remain front of mind for their future travel plans. This exciting new partnership with Tencent Games leverages the global trend of social gamification to showcase Dubai’s variety of world-class family entertainment and destination appeal to Chinese consumers. As such an important market for the emirate, with considerable growth potential, initiatives such as these support our ongoing mandate to be ‘China Ready’, a strategy that has allowed the city to add familiar touchpoints that cater to the specific needs of our Chinese guests, further enhancing their experience and highlighting Dubai as a ‘must-visit’ destination for future travellers”.

As the city continues to see positive year-on-year growth in Chinese visitors, with 650,000 Chinese tourists arriving in the  emirate between January – August 2019,  Dubai Tourism seeks to increase its market penetration by following its three-pronged approach; platform-based awareness programmes; customised trip planning and advocacy-driven collaborations; and in-city experiences and ‘China Readiness’ delivery.

Dubai Tourism’s partnership with Chinese conglomerates including Tencent, one of the world’s largest Internet and technology companies, and the extensive collaboration with the WeChat ecosystem, is aimed at further promoting Dubai as the preferred and ‘must-visit’ holiday destination of choice for Chinese travellers.

About Dubai’s Department of Tourism and Commerce Marketing (Dubai Tourism)

With the ultimate vision of positioning Dubai as the world’s leading tourism destination and commercial hub, Dubai Tourism’s mission is to increase the awareness of Dubai among global audiences and to attract tourists and inward investment into the emirate. Dubai Tourism is the principal authority for the planning, supervision, development and marketing of Dubai’s tourism sector. It markets and promotes the Emirate’s commerce sector, and is responsible for the licensing and classification of all tourism services, including hotels, tour operators and travel agents. Brands and departments within the Dubai Tourism portfolio include Dubai Business Events, Dubai Calendar, and Dubai Festivals and Retail Establishment.