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Massive Inc. Advertising Takes Off
Bluecobra writes "PlanetSide, a FPS-based MMO game published by Sony Entertainment of
America (SOE) is now using advertising in-game. PlanetSide already charges a fee of $12.99 a month to play and now users are also treated to Fanta, Coca-Cola, and Deuce Bigalow advertisements." Additionally, Martey writes "A recent patch to SWAT 4 introduces dynamic in-game advertising in the form of randomly generated posters on walls in the game. Provided by Massive, Inc., the game downloads new ads each time the game is loaded. Even more onerously, the game contacts Massive's servers to provide data about the length of time and viewing angles that the player looked at the posters."
As for advertising in other games, I have mixed feelings. For example, I would have no problem at all with a big Coke billboard showing up while I'm tooling around town in a GTA game. It's supposed to be based in a reality similar to our own, so if a company doing this kind of game can make a few bucks by selling ad space, more power to them. Using GTA as the example again, though, real commercials (that couldn't be turned off) on the in-game radio stations would stop me from buying the game. That kind of ad would be overly distracting for me.
As long as ads are unobtrusive (background) and organic to the game setting (no "The monks of Qeynos drinks Coke, why don't you?"), I think they're fine. It certainly doesn't bother me when I play a golf game and I choose the Ping golf clubs, nor does it put me out of sorts to drive a Chevy in a racing game. But if I'm exploring space, there'd better be a damn good continuity reason to be flying between stars and see a giant, flashing Nike logo...
I support that idea, at least, since I don't want my lv. 97 Superlative Love Ninja to heal up by drinking Sprite
That reminded me of a game from the olden days of the big, clunky, battery eating Game Gear.
I had to look it up, but I believe it was this game: Cool Spot. You were the 7UP dot, with arms and legs, and it was a platforming game. The game essentially WAS an advertisement. This is probably the biggest form of advertising ever in any video game, and I hope games don't turn for the worse and get so loaded with advertisements that we end up with games like this again.
from the screenshots it looks like you can shoot the adverts up. Prehaps make an adjammers clan. :)
it's very simple.
they will ignite an arms race, whereby patchers disable the intrusive ads and companies try to bring out more rapid "updates".
eventually though, Insidious Computing will put an end to patchers, whether they be anti-ad patches or no-cd patches or any patches at all. they'll sign the game files and if any alteration takes place that they don't allow, you're not going to make it happen.
they'll try to turn the pc into a very expensive console. i'm not sure they aren't succeeding already. many crippled cds/dvds come with extremely invasive copy prevention systems. they install several low level drivers (starforce) that more often than not interfere with the regular use of the computer. the fact that all these crippleware programs are spy/malware and are installed without your explicit permission, should be enough to anger many.
lots of people have complained about data loss due to these extreme measures. but more importantly, they restrict your ability to back up your own bought software. because copyright infringers have no such barriers, they can crank out copy after copy, even better than the originals in that they don't f*ck up your system.
i have refused to ever buy any starforce games or any games that don't have a no-cd patch. that we consumer sheep (i use the word consumer because if we were customers, we would have a say and we would be allowed to ask for lubrication) take this lying down is a low down dirty shame. i even see some ignorant people who claim that not being able to copy our own software which we bought legally is a feature. if you buy it, you have a legal and moral right to a back up and furthermore you have a "legal" and moral right not to have the disc inside your drive to play.
everyday, more and more i see that our ownership rights, what's left of them are going down the toilet. many rugrats (term i use for the mentally immature) even see this as a non-issue or even a positive thing... meaning they bought the propoganda hook line and sinker. it's depressing enough that i might as well give up gaming altogether. not like every application today isn't also calling home and what not.
i don't see this trend going away... but it could given the right conditions. that's all i have to look forward to...for now.
Science : Proprietary , Knowledge : Open Source
Well, we also had MC Kids for the NES (which wasn't half bad), and some game about Cheetos for the SNES... Chester Cheetah?
Those aside, I can't remember any other glaring examples offhand. I like to think that sort of thing died with the early 90's. Maybe you can count some sports games and that sort of thing in there since they're basically _made_ so that you're simulating playing football with actual players, driving real cars, etc. The people who buy those games, though, don't need to see NFL or McLaren (or whatever) ads--they're suffused with the former, and can't afford the latter. You could only succeed with this sort of ad cum game by pitching it to people who can afford it--sell popular junk food and junk TV to teens who're too brain-dead to realize they're not actually playing one big ad, but are doing so in essence. Throw it on top of the piles of ads in the uninspired TV they watch, the vapid magazines they read, the movies they watch at the theater; all the nonsense that people who don't buy crap because they saw it in between Big Brother and the nightly news put up with on an increasing basis.
I'm off-subject. Unless they come to dominate the genre, I'm not afraid of entire games devoted to promoting a product in this day and age. I'm afraid of the subtle infiltration of ads into other games, that I'll have to sit through three minutes of commercials while FFMCMXLI loads, or click through Sony ads whenever I die in Counter-Strike: Substance, or dine in GTA4 at Taco Bell. I don't want to see real-life ads in my video games, because I don't play video games to emulate real life. I don't want to play as cheeky pop-culture caricature Bingo Protagonist, siding with McDonald's or Burger King in between missions. I'd love to see more clever spoofs of real-world ads and corporations as much as I'd hate for the industry to be infiltrated by actual corporate advertising.
An Eldrich Gun-Fu Shotgun Dancer healing with a can of Sprunk could even be funny, under the right conditions.
how long till intrepid game hackers start putting ad-blocker mods out for these games?
Don't like the ads? There are two things you can do to protest. You could drop your subscription, never play anything with ads, and grumble about it on forums while the majority of people ignore them and play. You lose out on some fun, everyone else keeps doing their thing. Advertising finds it's home in games, people get used to it, and 10 years from now it looks like movie theaters today with all the advertising that happens there.
The other is my preferred method. Use the advertising model to protest. Make it cost more than it's worth to the advertiser. Create a bot that constantly goes from one ad to another, racking up seconds of view. Get everyone in your clan to spend 10 minutes doing nothing but watching ads every session so the cost of the ads will go up greatly. A few people creating protester scripts and unleashing them to the masses so that you can set it to watch ads all day while at work/school means many, many hours of ads being charged back to the advertising company. The method of advertising becomes very expensive yet the marketing departement does not show that it provides increased revenue. Upper management cans the advertising method as it is now nothing more than a money-hole.
The advertisements are showing up due to the "almighty dollar", why not use the dollar to send them away? I can't afford to buy the adspace and leave it blank, and I still want to play games. If I can do something to get rid of the ads I will - but I won't drop all video games and spend hours on a forum complaining that there's advertising in all the games I used to play.