The U.S. Army has unveiled a sponsorship deal with the Global Gaming League website estimated to be worth around $2 million USD. Beginning in June of this year the organisation will subsidise a "national gaming" area in an attempt to lure some of the site's 9.2 million paying players (who play titles ranging from first-person shooters to baseball) to sign up as its newest recruits. The Army hopes to attract males between the ages of 17 and 24, the demographic that makes up some 80 percent of the gaming site's population.

“The consumer model for traditional media is changing,” said Gary Bishop, who oversees Army marketing and advertising. “We’re grappling with the challenge of how do we better use new media to tell the Army story. Online is probably the best way.”

Players in the national gaming area can compete for prizes and rankings in a total of 15 games. Top players can move onto the upper rung of the competition ladder, facing off against one another in the service's America's Army videogame. From those, some will compete in a monthly Elite Forces tournament, with the chance to win the opportunity to try out the U.S. Army's sophisticated computer simulations of real-life combat. Joy.

The American military must meet monthly recruitment targets, so this massive leap into the realm of videogaming is being seen as a big push to aim for a huge, largely untapped market. But is portraying the life of a real soldier through a videogame simulation really the most sincere way to convey the dangerous life of a would-be grunt as part of the U.S. military?

“We’re taking the idea of military gaming and having the Army leverage an existing environment to find potential candidates for recruits,” said Reuben Hendell, CEO of MRM Worldwide, the agency tasked with creating the specialised games section.

Players can opt in to receive Army information when they register for the games.

“Once their hand is raised, we’ll pursue it,” said Anders Ekman, an executive VP with MRM. “There’s a pretty hefty [goal for leads] associated with this.”

While the Army has met its monthly recruitment goals through traditional media during the Iraq war, Bishop said the gaming deal presents a new opportunity “to tell the Army story. It’s not all about combat. Being in the Army is about driving trucks, welding, nurses and computers. If we have an opportunity to tell the Army story, we may have better influence.”