Game of Thrones (GOT) may be a medieval epic fantasy, but HBO Asia is giving this classic story a modern life through social media with a microsite, a Facebook page, and a Twitter account specifi cally for its audiences in 22 Asian territories.

“We basically want more people to know that Game of Thrones is coming to Asia. The genre of the show (fantasy) is not a genre HBO has gone into before, so we’re trying to reach out to the target audience,” said Karen Lai, HBO Asia’s Communications Director. And it just so happens, this audience spend a fair amount of time online on social media sites.

For the US launch of the series earlier this year, HBO ran a number of interactive campaigns, including the social game Battle for the Iron Throne through its Facebook page, and a series of multimedia puzzles, which when solved unlocked exclusive GOT clips. HBO also worked with agency Campfi re and Apple’s App Store, which introduced the show through distributing free GOT-themed food alongside menus containing hidden messages.

At the series’ microsite viewers can also get a lay of the social land through real-time feeds from Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. Conversations about almost every aspect pertinent to GOT pepper the site as word clouds, and a quick mouse rollover shows you the realtime exchange on a particular subject.

While other shows rely on their US counterparts to keep the social media buzz growing, HBO Asia knew early on that a distinct, regioncentric social media presence would prove valuable in increasing viewer engagement. In the nascent stages of social media networking, HBO Asia created a blog when it launched the comedy series Flight of the Conchords in 2008. When True Blood debuted a year later, it worked with a gaming website company to create Fang Fighter, an online game based on the series.

“We are probably one of the fi rst cable channels to embark on the social media networking activities. For Flight of the Conchords we had a contest where we asked viewers to make a short fi lm about something related to the show,” said Lai, adding, “But I think we were a little bit ahead of our time when we ran that contest. [In 2008] video recording devices were not as ubiquitous as they are now.”

GOT is based on the popular books by George R. R. Martin, but and as Lai explains, “In Asia there are different cultures, different languages. In the US they are more familiar with the content, because it’s based on a bestselling book. We need to explain it.” More importantly, according to Lai, “We want to create chatter, we want people to talk about it, we want to create buzz. In this day and age we cannot solely depend on traditional media. We have to engage the youth out there, engage the online users, and create conversations.”

Which is why aside from a standard microsite, HBO Asia has issued a challenge to the Twitterverse to retweet as many posts as they can to win prizes. When the series premieres on August 28, HBO Asia will also hold weekly trivia contests on its Facebook page. The retweet contest alone will make sure the show stays fresh on Twitter’s trending topics. Now that’s epic.