During the Covid, the castles of the Loire can be visited ... in Fortnite

It is undoubtedly THE hobby of the year 2020: video games have never been so popular as during the months of confinement.

The best known of them,

, already with over 250 million players worldwide, has obviously benefited from this global enthusiasm.

Usually, players face off against each other.

But in December, they can instead opt for a quiet visit ... of the Loire Valley castles.

The fruit of a marketing campaign, the "Center-Val de Loire Fortnite Tour", which mixes

and heritage and aims to attract a new audience, very real, to the estates of the castles.

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Castles modeled to the pixel

This operation may surprise since

is first known for its "Battle Royale" mode: 100 players who compete on an island with the objective of being the last survivor.

A priori, nothing to do with a peaceful stroll in the gardens of a Renaissance castle.

But Epic Games' video game also contains a creative mode in which you can create your own playground. And that's where it all plays out.

Each week, players can download (here) a "map", a special map in which is modeled a Loire castle and its gardens.

It is that of Chambord which opened the ball on December 4, followed by the castle of La Valette (December 11) then those of Amboise (December 18) and Chaumont-sur-Loire (January 8).

Each has been modeled to perfection by WSC, the esports marketing agency that set up the operation.

"We worked a lot with the castles. They provided us with a lot of documents, plans, visual recordings in drones. We used all of that to reconstruct the buildings", explains Théo Cellé, project manager at the agency.

Due to the technical constraints of 

, only the exteriors and the gardens were modeled.

Sightseeing while playing

Each castle is presented on Friday during a live on Twitch, on the channel of Solary, an esport team.

Professional players discover the map live, accompanied by Nota Bene, YouTuber specialist in history.

On this occasion, he delivers a few anecdotes on the various castles.

Objective: to interest gamers who are not inclined to be passionate about history.

"We also chose 

because it's a free game. And that goes well with the idea that culture must be accessible to everyone. We didn't want it to be paid or complicated," said Théo Cellé.

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But it's not just tourism. 

remains a game. In each castle, players can compete in a speed race that consists of collecting as many coins as possible in five minutes.

Those who will establish the best scores on the four castles will compete in a final, on January 15, on the map of the Clos Lucé estate, Leonardo da Vinci's last home.

"We wanted players to say to themselves, through these entertaining mini-games: 'ah, this castle is super cool!'", Explains Théo Cellé.

Turning 

gamers

 into real visitors

In fact, millions of players will be roaming the pixelated gardens of the Loire Valley castles in the coming weeks.

For François Bonneau, president of the Center-Val de Loire region, this partnership is a unique opportunity to attract future visitors.

"We are going to show the beauty of Chambord, La Valette, Amboise, Chaumont-sur-Loire and Clos-Lucé to an audience of enthusiasts. The players will walk in the gardens, around the castles, it's great," said himself. he rejoices at the microphone of Europe 1.

And the operation is timely.

The châteaux of the Loire, which were preparing to reopen on December 15, will finally have to wait until December 7, like cinemas, theaters and museums, as Jean Castex announced on Thursday.

This does not prevent François Bonneau from being optimistic for the future: "Thanks to this partnership, we will reach a new audience. Young people and video game players, professionals and amateurs alike, are not the usual public of châteaux. This is very positive. "