Slashdot Mirror
Full-Motion Ads Come to Videogames
Carl Bialik from the WSJ writes "'Advertising in videogames, dominated in the past by static ads such as billboards and signposts, is beginning to look more like TV commercials,' according to the Wall Street Journal. Massive, the company that brought still ads to videogames last year, is now introducing full-motion ads to PC-based games (not yet console titles). Massive CEO Mitchell Davis 'says Hollywood movie studios have shown particular interest in running 15-second movie trailers in online games.' Also of note: 'One problem with the full-motion ads is that gamers can easily avoid watching them. The full-motion ads start playing when a player moves near the ad spot on the screen -- and stop playing when the player moves away. As a result, gamers may see only a few seconds of the 15-second ads. Massive says it won't charge advertisers unless the full ad has been viewed.'"
..of "Ad locations" maps will flourish alongside this intiative. That, or mods to remove them altogether. Although that might chnge the game rating....
I never spellcheck and I freely admit it. Save your karma for more worthwhile "lol erorrs" replies
>>Massive says it won't charge advertisers unless the full ad has been viewed.'"
And how do they intend to track this? This is pretty scary. I kind of thought that the purpose of gaming servers was to facilitate gaming and interaction between players...not to monitor their activity.
Where does one draw the line as to what is and isn't monitored?
wbs.
Huh?
So, basically what you're saying is that the 40 gb hard drive I have now will be filled up with advertisements? And furthermore, shouldn't I be able to have a game that's free of advertisements, seeing as I allready paid $49.95 for the game?
-gjr
It's true. :-(
So this means all our games now will be free...right? Like our commercial TV is free cause we watch all the ads.
And just like going to the movies is now free cause of all the ads in the beginning...right?
/Sarcasm mode terminated.
This is bullshit. If the consumer isn't getting any benefits out of it I guess I'll avoid the privilege of paying for something that throws advertisements at me.
"Leo Fender was in a 'state of grace' when he designed the Stratocaster." -- Paul Reed Smith
And I wont pay for games which have advertisements. *period*. I play games to *GET AWAY* from the bullshit that i the modern world.
Religion is a gateway psychosis. -- Dave Foley
Putting more ads before movies has been working great for that industry.
"suspension of disbelief" is not profitable.
Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
"One problem with the full-motion ads is that gamers can easily avoid watching them."
How sad is it that this is considered a problem?
I couldn't agree more.
From TFA:
Fuck you Gerry Rich. It's not incumbent on you to reach me. I want you to leave me the fuck alone and keep your god damn ads out of my face. I will never pay for any video game that I know beforehand has full motion ads in it.
Question everything
The adds before a movie bother me a little, but if they tried to insert an add in the middle it would really upset me. It seems like this is what they are trying to do with video games. What they could do though is use more product placement. There are plenty of fake branded soda machines in Doom 3 and Halflife that could certainly have been Coke or Pepsi machines. I wouldn't have minded, really. If done correctly I think we can find a happy medium.
GENERATION 25: The first time you see this, copy it into your sig on any forum and add 1 to the generation. Social exper
or:
Game Narrator: "For watching this ad you get XXX gold added to your profile"
and gamers will flock to watch ads
If I go to Mars to kick ass and drink beer, I don't think it matters what brand of beer it would be. In fact if I was a smart advertiser, I'd make sure it was the competition's ads.
This bullshit of placing ads is likely to backfire and people will stay away in droves.
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
Unless the game is free, there should be no adds. If there are adds in the game and there was no warning on the box I would look into a law suit. I'm 90% sure there are disclosure laws that cover this kind of thing. And of course if there is a warning on the box that the game has adds in it, I wont be buying it.
People used to say the same thing about Cable TV.
What?
I'll accept this if they fit in the ads nicely. I want a random coke can I knock over in D3, or a "poster" in a corridor. As long as you don't interrupt my game play, or ruin my experience, fine. It's all about subtlety. We'll see who controls the amount of ads and how annoying they are. I'm guessing whoever has the largest pockets.
If I'm playing Doom 4 and I have to watch an ad before I proceed, or an ad ruins the environment (brightens the area); expect me to return your game.
Have the advertisers pay for some UT2k4 servers, then set the respawn to 15 seconds, and play adverts after you're gibbed!
This is how I would like to see advertizers get involved in the gaming industry. If they bring value to the table, consumers will appreciate their involvement. Sadly, these greedheads aren't looking to support gamers by hosting servers and providing bandwidth. They want to exploit gamers as a captive audience for their solicitations. No different from commercials in movie theaters. Advertizers are instead creating a hostile relationship with consumers.
Support gaming through sponsorship = goodwill generated
Exploit captive audience = irritating
Stop invasive commercials in movie theaters.
Seth
$5 / month hosted VPS on linux = awesome!
I sort of agree, as long as it's done well.
An example of where it's done poorly is Burnout 3. EA got their hands all over that one, and besides shoving a mostly crap soundtrack in it, they also plastered billboards for their games everywhere. Fair enough, when you drive around in real life, you see billboards too. But in Burnout, a lot of the EA billboards look like ass, they've very repetitive, and they don't have normal billboard qualities. Billboards generally have something amusing, or funny, or in some way eyecatching. They usually aren't just a crappy logo and a big title for some product.
In the grand theft auto games, the cities are full of signs with puns or clever mixups of what you might see in a real city. It doesn't effect the flow of the gameplay much, because it's done in a subtle way, but if you're just wandering around, it brings a little more entertainment to you, which is the whole point of games anyways.
Not to mention letting the developers/artists have fun. Would you rather draw a nice texture for choco-vitamins sugar pills or whatever goofy product you made up, or would you rather cut and paste logos that some marketing guy threw on your desk? The enthusiasm of the development team shows through. Maybe that's why the EA billboards in Burnout look so crappy.
One time I threw a brick at a duck.
1. As long as they make people CLEARLY aware that this is happening. Which they wouldn't, since most people would then avoid it. There's a reason we had to resort to a do-not-call list in the country, and a reason that advertisers are trying to get rid of it.
2. My concern is not that people will realize how this is an invasion and avoid these games. It is that people won't care and support it anyway, proving it is a valid form of advertisement. I don't worry about people who hate this kind of crap, I worry about the ones who don't hate it. The ones who respond to spam, the ones who click on popups, the ones who give away personal info for a shiny new pen. Those are the people who are aiding in the proliferation of this crap.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
Even beyond the obvious stupidity of this in an online game, this thought comes to mind after reading the article:
"17-34 year old males are a hard demographic to market to."
Could it be because we're tired of ads that we don't give a flying shit about and we can make up our own minds about products?
I own a tivo for skipping comercials (and recording robot chicken of course), I use privoxy to block all ads on webpages, I spam filter my email on the server which I run and on my mail client for anything that sneaks past the server (1 in 2700 spams presently! Go greylisting and multiple bayes filters and uri blacklisting), I'm on the do not call list and won't give companies I do business with my real phone number, Could it be, just maybe, that under no circumstances, for no reason, do I want to see a fucking ad about something I don't care about? Could it be that if I want to know something about a product I'll look it up myself? Could it be you need to fucking get out of my house, out of my life, and quit wasting my time, space, and resources? yes. it could.
Could it be the first game I play with this technology I'll dedicate some programming time to figuring out ways to disable it? Absolutely!
Fucking idiots, let me spell it out:
MOST OF US DONT WANT TO SEE FUCKING ADS IN OUR RECREATIONAL TIME-- THIS IS LARGELY THE FUCKING REASON WE'RE HARD TO MARKET TO-- BECUASE WE DONT WANT TO BE MARKETED TO.
Shadus
One problem with the full-motion ads is that gamers can easily avoid watching them.
Sorry, but we don't owe you SHIT. If we paid for the game, movie, whatever... we aren't obligated to watch your fucking ads.
Instead, there will be patches made to circumvent your ads. How bout that?
We have secretly replaced these Slashdot mods' sense of humor with a rusty nail. Let's see if they notice!!