Gazprom Neft Shelf X Lifehacker: "Arctic Detective" - Web Quest About Prirazlomnaya And The Arctic

Objective

Gazprom Neft Shelf sought to build awareness of Arctic offshore operations and the Prirazlomnaya platform among Russian audiences while elevating the status of oil industry professions. The company partnered with Lifehacker to present complex technical and environmental topics through an engaging interactive narrative experience rather than conventional corporate communications, deliberately linking the two locations central to its business — the Arctic, where shift personnel work, and St. Petersburg, home to the company's office.

Solution

The project combined three game mechanics—visual novel storytelling, knowledge quizzes, and hidden object gameplay—in a location-based web quest hosted on Lifehacker's site. Players assumed the role of Semyon, a boatswain from the Prirazlomnaya platform, navigating real St. Petersburg landmarks to locate a missing Arctic puffin named Bering. An onboarding sequence introduced the story, the search objective, and the rules before players chose their first location on a city map and entered a visual-novel scene. Dialogue with characters revealed hints about Prirazlomnaya, Arctic ecology, and oil-industry professions; a quiz block on Arctic facts and production safety followed, with a correct answer unlocking a "key." A hidden object scene then had players search for artifacts tied to those dialogue hints, unlocking the next real-world location and episode. A progress bar and a collection of found artifacts tracked advancement, with retry attempts offered after wrong answers. The quest concluded with Semyon and Bering's reunion and a results screen inviting players to replay the game to uncover alternate dialogue lines and findings. The visual identity was developed by illustrator Irina Saldina; the experience included an original audio album titled "Prirazlomnaya. Na Sever ot 66°33′44"N" featuring industrial sounds and Arctic wildlife recordings.

Results

The campaign reached over 1.3 million people with more than 38,000 unique players completing the full experience. The project received the Silver award in the 'Best PR Project in Energy' category at the 2024 Press Service of the Year professional competition, with judges commending how it made 'narrowly specialized topics engaging and unconventional.'