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In-Game Advertising To Top $800 Million By 2012
GamesIndustry.biz reports on comments from analyst firm Parks Associates on the bright future for game advertisements. General advertising for games is expected to skyrocket in the next few years, reaching some $2 billion by the year 2012. Additionally in-game advertising, which ran about $55 million last year, is expected to reach $800 Million in the same year. "'Advertising in electronic games had an average monthly household expenditure of less than 50 cents in 2006, while broadcast TV was at $37, meaning advertisers are not using the gaming medium to its full potential,' said Yuanzhe Cai, Parks Associates' director of broadband and gaming. 'If executed correctly, game advertising can provide a win-win solution for advertisers, developers and publishers, console manufacturers, game portals, and gamers.'"
Money has to come from somewhere. If developers can earn money by selling advertising, it means they will be able to spend more time polishing up their projects at the end of the development cycle instead of having to push the product out the door early to start getting money from sales.
Overall, that means fewer rushed titles, late patches, and incomplete games. Will some publishers abuse advertising for quick profit? Of course. But don't come out with something like BOYCOTT ALL GAMES WITH ADVERTISING KEKEKEKEKEKEKE because you don't understand that developers need money in order to do what they love.
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"'Advertising in electronic games had an average monthly household expenditure of less than 50 cents in 2006, while broadcast TV was at $37, meaning advertisers are not using the gaming medium to its full potential,' said Yuanzhe Cai
Jeez, you think? Maybe it's because there are many, many more poeple watching TV than playing video games. In fact, I think that number is not too far off from it's appropriate scale.
Let's run some figures... Gaming age is about 15 to 35. Lifespan is about 70 years, and we start watching TV about age 5 now. Not many girls, and some boys aren't interested in gaming -at all-, and let's suppose that 50% of the people in that age range, but there is hardly anyone that doesn't watch TV.
So if we pull 2 average people from each year from 5 to 70, we have approximately 130 tv watchers, and 20 gamers. So the ratio is 6.5 to 1 or so. So the $.50 should be more like $5.50 or so. The article makes it sound like it should be up at $37 per person.
In short: There's a ton of spin on this using numbers that don't -mean- anything in the current context.
"If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you; But if you really make them think, they'll hate you." - DM
I think overall it will mean more rushed titles.
You've got to get that game out the door so you can get a new batch of advertisers for your next game.
Look at what advertising has done for television. It used to be one company would fund a show entirely and they might break from the show once or twice an hour to tell you about that one product(how do you think soap operas got their name?)
Now you're lucky if you get 30 minutes of showtime in an hour block and even during the shows they feel the need to have advertisements splash across the screen with their own sound effects sometimes covering up crucial images or dialogue.
Advertising in games might not sound that bad now but once they get a taste they will just try and saturate games more and more. How long do you think until they have 20 minutes of previews before you can play like they do for movies?
IOU one (1) signature
How about this novel concept: Make a killer game, and sell a lot of copies!
When was the last time Zelda or Mario needed Nike/Coke/Dodge ads to make money? I'm with the parent, screw'em. I don't want them, and I don't need them. There are plenty of great games to play that don't make me feel dirty or insulted. So many recent games lost sales from me and my circle for in-game ads, such as Crackdown earlier this year. I enjoyed the demo, but after a single distraction (large dodge truck ad) I was done. Battlefield 2142 is another fine example, might as well re-name the sucker adware42, and it has no business on my PC.
If developers want to see my money, all they have to do is a make a great game, and leave all that "sponsored by" crap in the splash screen or on the box. You can't even begin to imagine my disappointment in last weeks news with Quake:ET, a game I've been following for years...
The bottom line is, if your development cost are so high that you have to start selling ad space in your game world, then maybe it's time you evaluate your development processes, and the game in question; for something has gone horribly wrong.
-Buddy of DoQ
I will never purchase a game with ingame adverting. No one should. You bought the game, paid good money for it, and now you have to pay again by looking at banal advertising. The sherlock that thought this up should be taken out and shot, regardless of the amount of revenue.
What I'm curious about is if there is a way to block ingame advertisements with some program or filtering mechanism. Ad companies are responsible for the funding of malware to a large degree. If it weren't for the ads these adware makers wouldn't have an income. We should be suing the advertisers directly instead of letting our kids become bombarded with constant ads.
A computer game is immersive. We don't need to be bothered by advertisers trying to sell us something. These people are the falling off edge of stupidity. They all should be barred from anything computers.
You can lead a man with reason but you can't make him think.
The problem is making the ads actually fit into the game. For instance, in Super Monkey Ball, the bananas have Dole stickers on them. Every single one of them. You don't even notice it all the time, and it's kind of funny to see them on there. It doesn't really detract from the game in any way. However, working ads into games like Mario or Zelda would probably be impossible without it looking like blatant advertising. Other games might do very well. ExciteTruck could easily have trucks with real company logos on them. Just as Need For Speed has always had real cars. I don't think this kind of thing detracts from the games. It isn't actually blatant advertising, but does promote that "brand awareness" concept that advertisers are always looking for.
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
Did you believe them when they said, since cable TV has subscription fees, there won't be any need to advertise during the shows...
...you don't understand that developers need money in order to do what they love. Right, they do need money. That's why they SELL GAMES. Now they're trying to sell games AND sell advertising, cashing in twice on the same thing. Their customers pay for the game, they don't want to pay for the game and the commercials. If the games were discounted or free, sure, advertising might work as a business model. So far, it doesn't look like that's where the game publishers that want to use in-game advertising are going. It's been quite blatantly a quick-cash-in move, which we gamers tend to hate, and rightfully so.In-game advertising will not result in any of the following:
-Cheaper games
-Better games
-Greater adherence to release schedules
It will result in the following:
-Same prices of games
-Same quality of games
-Same adherence to release schedules
-Annoying in-game advertisments
That's all there is to it.
I don't know about you, but my servers run on the power of cotton candy and happy thoughts. -Anonymous Coward
If the ads are appropriate for the setting the game is in, then they become part of the environment of the game. For example, seeing real-life ads on billboards in a game like Grand Theft Auto does not detract from the game at all. It takes place in a modern day city, and you would expect to see such billboards if you were really there. However, placing things like this in a futuristic or fantasy game would destroy it.