1) Someone was like ‘let’s make a ridiculously lame flash game as part of our advertisement. Kinda like those shock-the-monkey games, but more of a Nintendo, 8 bit feel.’

2) This same bored programmer starts throwing together a crappy game with a crappy premise. It’s somewhat fun, but with no real appeal.

and here’s the real advertisement genius:
3) Some creative marketing director said ‘You know what? That’s a good idea. Let’s do it.’

4) The crappy flash game got my attention, and got me to finish the stupid level, taking 20-30 seconds out of my day for no real reason, yet made me feel uncomfortably satisfied with my useless accomplishment.

4.b)I now associate Cheetos with mythological creatures and slightly satisfying advertising. It is somewhat of a breath of fresh air when considering 99% of all other advertisements out there.

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so, in retrospect, there was some combination of staff and management that took a risk, and it paid off. I applaud the staff more than the management (as usual), but overall it deserves more than the dismissive ‘WTF’ response that is aforementioned in this blog.

I think you’re underselling it as a knee-jerk reaction, or ‘wtf’ response.

I do acknowledge your final paragraph which attempts to applaud said advertising efforts, however.