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In-Game Adverts Could Reach $2 Billion?
Via 1up, a story on the Adweek site positing that in-game ads could reach $2 Billion by the end of the decade. The story discusses Massive, the streaming ad firm, and their success in reaching eyeballs. From the article: "Those customers include the majority of the major film and entertainment studios, according to Davis, as well as brands such as Coca-Cola, Subway, Honda, and Gillette. Davis said that Massive was benefiting from an 'overwhelming trend away from mass marketing' that is making the medium's men 18-34-dominated audience more attractive to more brands, even sometimes slow-moving packaged-goods advertisers."
As offencive as this is, I think that this is the overall mood toward ingame advertising. I feel the same way about it, so long as the advertising would be completely out of place. Medieval settings with advertising are almost (not never, sadly enough) ad-free, while product placement happens in a lot of contemporary games. But there is a argument that it does help immersion in a game setting that it makes sense in. I would personally not care if I were playing a swat game and happened to find a coca cola machine in the lobby of some building. It should offset the price a bit, maybe 45$ instead of 50$, though I know that software makers will never do this. We all know that the biggest problem games are sports games. They are, for the most part, shovelware. When a developer knows the game will sell by the title alone and not reviews or word of mouth, then they will put in every possible ad to make as much money out of it as they can.
They also put a discrete NIN logo on all the ammo crates that had nails in them.
I am one of many. My idea is not unique, nor do I expect my voice alone to sway you. I speak in a chorus of opinion.