McDonald's McValue launch boosted 442% in engagement with a gamified experience

Overview

McDonald's wanted to reach Black Gen-Z with their McValue menu in a way that drove real engagement. By Default worked with REVOLT as its digital creative partner to further develop the concept, strategy, art direction, game mechanics, and build, delivering the campaign from idea to launch in 8 weeks.

We designed and built a gamified memory card game that matched users to a personalised McValue combo meal based on their lifestyle and rewarded them with a promo voucher.

Approach

Gen-Z consumers don't engage with content that talks at them. They engage with content that reflects how they see themselves. Research consistently shows this generation's purchasing decisions are tied to identity and self-expression. A generic interest quiz wouldn't capture that, and a standard promotional unit wouldn't earn time from an audience that scrolls past most branded content by default.

The campaign needed to feel native to how Black Gen-Z actually live, not broad demographic categories that could apply to anyone.

The original brief suggested matching cards by broad interests like music and food preferences. We pushed the strategy further toward lifestyle moments, specific to how Black Gen-Z audiences actually live.

We designed eight lifestyle moments across four categories. Each one paired with a McValue combo that matched the energy of that moment. The audience picks their lifestyle. The game matches their meal. 44% of Gen-Z are willing to trade personal data for a more tailored experience. We gave them one worth trading for.

Outcomes

The experience launched as an interactive memory card game, pairing players with personalised McValue combo matches, rewarding them with a promo reward voucher, and presenting a social-first results screen designed for sharing. Menus, sound cues, and scoreboards elevated the promotion into a moment of discovery and self-expression, rather than a static unit.

In four weeks, the campaign delivered 3.6M impressions and 703K unique visitors. 46K interaction clicks translated into a 6.5% interaction rate, outperforming the benchmark by 442%. From idea to launch, the work was delivered in eight weeks.