SDCC 2026: Paramount+ Turns Booth #3529 Into a Press Play Arcade

San Diego Comic-Con has never been short on giant screens, display cases and photo walls, but Paramount+ took a more hands-on route in 2026. At Booth #3529 inside the San Diego Convention Center, the streamer installed the Press Play Arcade, a compact collection of custom arcade-style games inspired by Avatar Aang: The Last Airbender, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, South Park and Among Us. The booth was available to Comic-Con badge holders from Preview Night on Wednesday, July 22 through Sunday, July 26, matching the convention’s official exhibit-hall run. Instead of asking visitors simply to look at upcoming franchises, Paramount+ gave them tokens, games to play, tickets to collect and branded prizes to redeem—a format that turned promotional material into a small competitive loop on the show floor.

Four franchises, one arcade-driven concept

Paramount’s official Comic-Con guide described the Press Play Arcade as an interactive gaming experience where visitors could compete in custom games based on four properties and win branded prizes. That mix was unusually broad: a new animated Avatar adventure, the current Star Trek television flagship Strange New Worlds, the long-running animated satire South Park and the social-deduction phenomenon Among Us all shared the same booth. The common language was not genre but play. That mattered on a crowded convention floor, where a short game can create a clearer memory than another trailer running above a queue. Post-convention reporting by KPBS confirmed how the concept worked in practice: attendees received tokens, played themed games, collected tickets and exchanged those tickets for prizes.

Avatar turns a running joke into Cabbage Cart Madness

For Avatar fans, the booth’s signature attraction was “Cabbage Cart Madness,” a game built around one of the universe’s most enduring visual jokes: the repeated destruction of an unfortunate cabbage merchant’s stock. The choice made the activation immediately readable to longtime fans without requiring a complicated explanation. It also arrived at a strategically perfect moment. Avatar Aang: The Last Airbender premiered globally on Paramount+ on Saturday, July 25, during Comic-Con weekend, after a fan screening in Ballroom 20 on Friday evening. The new animated story follows Aang and his friends as they race to secure an ancient power before it can fall into the wrong hands and destabilize the peace they fought to create. The arcade therefore functioned as both fan service and a launch-weekend touchpoint for one of Paramount+’s most important franchise releases.

Star Trek’s 60th anniversary extends to Booth #3529

Star Trek occupied an equally visible place in the Press Play Arcade through the Strange New Worlds “Bridge Command Memory Game.” The timing was significant: 2026 marks the 60th anniversary of Star Trek, and Paramount built a convention-wide celebration rather than limiting the franchise to one panel or display. The official physical Comic-Con badges featured the U.S.S. Enterprise flying above the San Diego Convention Center, while Star Trek programming spread across screenings, panels, collectibles presentations and fan experiences. Inside Booth #3529, the memory game translated that anniversary campaign into a quick, playable challenge, giving attendees another way to engage with Strange New Worlds between the convention’s larger scheduled events.

A booth connected to a much larger Star Trek campaign

The arcade was only one piece of Paramount’s Star Trek footprint. Paramount+ and CBS Studios also staged programming around Strange New Worlds, including a Friday, July 24 fan screening at San Diego’s Balboa Theatre. Beyond the convention center, the Paramount+ Lodge at Happy Does included a Port Galley environment inspired by Strange New Worlds and displayed the original U.S.S. Enterprise model provided by the Roddenberry Estate. Paramount’s wider Comic-Con program also promoted collaborations involving LEGO and Magic: The Gathering. Seen in that context, the Bridge Command Memory Game was deliberately small-scale: it gave passing exhibit-hall traffic a fast Star Trek interaction while more elaborate anniversary experiences were distributed around downtown San Diego.

South Park and Among Us broaden the audience

South Park and Among Us completed the four-franchise arcade lineup. Paramount’s own guide explicitly listed both properties alongside Avatar Aang: The Last Airbender and Star Trek: Strange New Worlds as inspirations for the custom games. Their inclusion helped the booth avoid feeling like a single-release campaign. South Park brought decades of instantly recognizable comedy, while Among Us added a gaming-native property whose audience already understands competition, repetition and quick social play. KPBS’s on-site account specifically noted Star Trek, South Park and Avatar games in action, along with the token-and-ticket prize system, providing an independent snapshot of how the booth’s promised arcade mechanics translated to the attendee experience.

The Paramount+ Lodge expands the same strategy off-site

Paramount+ paired the official booth with the returning Paramount+ Lodge at Happy Does, 340 Fifth Avenue in the Gaslamp District. The Lodge was separate from Comic-Con and did not require an SDCC badge, allowing the company to reach fans beyond the convention-floor audience. Its attractions expanded several of the same worlds represented in the arcade: a Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Port Galley, the original U.S.S. Enterprise model from the Roddenberry Estate, a Republic City Marketplace tied to Avatar Aang: The Last Airbender, a South Park experience, photo opportunities and giveaways. The contrast was useful. Booth #3529 emphasized fast games and prize redemption; the Lodge emphasized themed environments, exploration and photography.

Paramount spreads its SDCC presence across San Diego

The two Paramount+ spaces also sat within a much broader company strategy. Paramount’s 2026 Comic-Con program included activity from Nickelodeon, Pluto TV, Paramount Games Studio and Paramount Products & Experiences, with installations both inside the convention center and across the surrounding Gaslamp area. Pluto TV, for example, made its convention-floor debut with “What’s in Store,” a futuristic video-store concept built around immersive genre rooms. Rather than concentrating every brand under a single corporate banner, Paramount distributed experiences according to how fans would interact with them—games on the floor, larger immersive builds off-site, screenings in theaters and franchise programming in convention rooms.

Why the Press Play Arcade worked as fan engagement

The Press Play Arcade’s strongest idea was also its simplest: it converted intellectual property into an action. A visitor did not merely stand beside an Avatar logo or watch a Star Trek clip; the visitor played, scored, collected and redeemed. The ticket system added the familiar rhythm of a real arcade and gave branded prizes a sense of being earned rather than simply handed out. That approach is especially suited to Comic-Con, where attendees constantly decide whether an activation is worth the queue. A short game provides a defined payoff, while the four-franchise structure gave Paramount+ several different entry points for fans who might have arrived for one property and discovered another.

A compact showcase of Paramount+ fandom at SDCC 2026

With Avatar Aang: The Last Airbender launching globally during the convention, Star Trek celebrating six decades, and South Park and Among Us widening the mix, Booth #3529 became a concise snapshot of Paramount+’s 2026 fandom strategy. The Press Play Arcade did not attempt to reproduce the scale of the company’s off-site Lodge. Instead, it used the logic of an arcade—recognizable themes, immediate rules, repeatable play and rewards—to make a busy exhibit-floor booth feel participatory. In a Comic-Con increasingly defined by experiences as much as announcements, Paramount+ found a direct way to turn four very different franchises into something attendees could physically do, remember and take home.

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Photos and video 4K : Boris Colletier / Mulderville