Google Brings Ads To Games, Game Ads To YouTube

Reuters reports that YouTube will be partnering with Amazon and iTunes to provide the ability to purchase games and songs that are in or related to YouTube's hosted videos. For example, watching footage from Spore will bring up a link to purchase the actual game through Amazon. The sales revenue will be shared. In related news, Google has launched a public beta for their in-game advertising software based on Adsense. "Google is initially targeting the sweet spot for its technology: games based in Adobe's Flash platform and which run in a web browser with no download. ... [Christian Oestlien, senior product manager at Google] said that Google's advertisers can use the software to insert ads into games or videos for YouTube, making the ads more versatile. Developers of games can use Flash software development kits to designate the points in a game that make an 'ad request.'"

Comments

Ads in Games

[MosesJones]

Back in 1999 myself and some friends actually looked at creating a networked gaming infrastructure company, not creating games but focusing on the bit that (back then) games companies really sucked at, the actual software infrastructure required for distributed games. One of the things we proposed in there was the ability to serve targeted advertisements into games.

Trouble was in 1999 that everyone wanted to fund .coms and advertising revenue was just about eyeballs so targeting wasn't required apparently.

Expect this to very quickly go from Flash games into any game that connects to the internet, its a great new revenue stream for companies.

Re:Ads in Games

[eldavojohn]

Expect this to very quickly go from Flash games into any game that connects to the internet, its a great new revenue stream for companies.

Why does it have to connect to the internet?

Isn't Burger King releasing games funded entirely by Burger King with Burger King themes in them? (Did I mention Burger King?)

When I was tiny and we had our first x86 machine, I recall receiving a free 7-up game from the local supermarket that was a 3.5 diskette. You played spot, the 7-up mascot in an Othello rip off against another person next to you or the computer. Is this any different?

Would I be shocked to see ad funded games hitting the shelves? Nope. I wouldn't be surprised to see free discs & downloads of games where a car company makes a racing game or a soda company makes a mario party-ish game ...

I'm not too hip on this idea though, the last thing I want is more advertisement in my life. They seem like a distraction & waste of time. But since they fund a lot of what I do for entertainment, they're here to stay!

Re:Ads in Games

[MosesJones]

Its not about add funded games its about using games to sell targeted advertisements. All of those billboards in sports games and the "realistic" FPS games, perfect for slapping on an ad targeted just at YOU. Others in the game will see different adverts on exactly the same space.

Advertiser funded is old hat, this is about turning games into virtual billboard environments

Re:Ads in Games

[insllvn]

Isn't Burger King releasing games [slashdot.org] funded entirely by Burger King with Burger King themes in them? (Did I mention Burger King?)

It's a fine establishment! Plus, did you know that you can get a refill on any drink? For free!?!

Don't ruin the immersion

[Coopjust]

Ads actually fit pretty well in some games. I saw ads for the movie Ocean's 13 in the game Crackdown. Cities have billboards, and they weren't an unrealistic amount.

However, I have a breaking point. When Sony Online Entertainment put Jeep ads in Planetside (an alternate galaxy futuristic MMO FPS), it was my breaking point and I quit my subscription. I didn't buy Battlefield 2142 for the same reason: the ads ruined the gameplay immersion.

Ads are OK if they fit into the environment. Otherwise, leave them out. I would rather pay $10 additional to not have gameplay tarnished by ads that stick out like a sore thumb.

Re:Don't ruin the immersion

[geobeck]

You can fit a Burger King add into Iron Man and play it off as a quirky character moment, but you can't really shill for, well, anything in something like The Hobbit.

"Bilbo! Don't sit on the verge like a lump; we must make haste!"
"I'm sorry, Gandalf, but my poor feet aren't meant for such a long journey outside the Shire."
"When my feet ache from a long day's journey, I find relief in Gold Bond medicated powder..."

Works for me. :D

Re:Don't ruin the immersion

[Ender77]

No they don't. I can't speak for all gamers, but I go into games to GET AWAY FROM REALITY, not to have it thrown in my face. Ads will KILL innovation in games, instead of creating a few original (scifi/fantasy) gems, we will get nothing but grand theft auto generic clones where EVERYTHING happens in modern city/environment so game companies (like fraktard EA) can get ad revenue.

Re:Don't ruin the immersion

[rtb61]

The really strange thing about all of this. There is absolutely no real way of validating that the adds were of any value or that they had opposite effect and actually put people off. The big thing is not to sell products but to convince sellers that the adds work and that they buy the space.

So you can imagine the sales demo, where the people selling add space demonstrate the screens where the adds appear and waffles on how the gamer must focus and see the add, of course the naive person buying the add space is not actually playing the game so they don't get a real impression of how a gamer is likely to react to that add.

So a gamer plays a game and is pretty solidly focused on the game play, tends to ignore and block out anything that doesn't affect game play and, you really think a billboard appearing in one small section of the screen that doesn't provide any required game information, will have any real impact at all. Bullshit does often sell, it just really depends who the B$ advertising is targeted at, the people selling product and buying add space or customer who might have been looking for that product in the past.

Could be ok

[I.M.O.G.]

I would like to see it done right. Seeing as how google really took advertising away from the banner ad approach with the dominance of their contextual text ads, perhaps they will get this in-game advertising right.

What is right?

1) Don't interrupt me. Really. Figure out how to work it in, but not weigh it down or intrude.
2) Make it useful. I don't care for how it looks cheesy when you go to a vending machine in a game and all it has is fake product garbage. Normal advertising you encounter daily, like vending machines, is unobtrusive but also raises brand awareness while it provides some realism to the game.
3) Again, don't interrupt me. Stay out of the way, and a whole industry won't crop up around you trying to remove your ad content. (popup blockers)

Bottom line, I don't think ads coming into games is that bad of a thing, but they have to be done tastefully and not detract from the title your playing.

Re:Could be ok

[kabocox]

Get ready for the Themed ads. Are you in a fantasy setting? Get ready for ye old Coke Ale. O.k. really only "true" old style beer and their ads should show up there. I have no idea what that would be. Anything from the early 1920s up could have all sorts of old style coke ads. Heck, Coke could make a massive list of their entire ad history and the various times each has run. Then they'd re-run those same ads in each of the games set in each era. If you have a 1960s game, you get 1960s coke ads. If the game is set in 1980s, you get that style of coke ads. They could be tricky and try posting next years ad campaign any game that they can find set next year. Or do one better and come up with future themed ads now sell 'em to the game companies and when that time frame comes up use them in real life. ;)

Ad companies should have a love/hate thing with this. Basically once create any physical ad for any company, you also create an online one for games and you some how arrange for the game company to report back how many players have passed by/viewed the ad or you get the ad to do it by itself within the game. Ideally, they could be years into the future off one really good ad today. They'd hate it though because every ad idea that they've ever sold to anyone could be out there competing for eyeballs.

Basically if the ad folks can get you stop looking at the strippers in Duke Nuke 'em Forever and actually look at their porn ads on the walls or outside the stripper joint, then they'd have a success. ;)

games to ads?

[gEvil (beta)]

I was hoping they'd bring games to ads. And then for some reason I felt like punching a monkey.

DRM 1 Star Mob

[Wellington Grey]

For example, watching footage from Spore will bring up a link to purchase the actual game through Amazon

Ouch. Amazon might not be the best place to try and sell spore...

-Grey

Ads and MMOs

[Wiarumas]

Hey, this reminds me of one of the conversations me and one of my old High School friends once had. The idea was to have people buy the game (MMO) flat out. Then, either pay a monthly fee that would be ad free or play for free with ads here and there. I'm sure there are people out there that would LOVE to play WoW for free by having to deal with ads during login and plastered all over the capital cities... and I'm sure there are some that won't. Either way, I'd say its a plausible market especially in the MMO universe.

Re:Ads and MMOs

[pjt33]

RuneScape?

As Seen in World of Warcraft... SPIDER EGGS

[mfh]

EXT. Stonetalon Mountains (North West of Orgrimmar)

ENTER: Mackror the Mighty Orc Huntar

Mackror (yells): "I HAS CAPTURED 9/15 SPIDAR DEEPMOSS EGGS!!! FEW MORE TO GO!!!"

[ENTER: Homing Pigeon]

(makes pigeon crap on Mackror, sputters around... and lands on Macror's shoulder)

Mackror: "ARGH WAT! A NOTE!" (reads note)

"AIG Insurrance of Ogrimmar!!!! HAS GOLD. Invest to protect your new QUEST ITEM: DEEPMOSS SPIDER EGGS from decay and theft. Insure your home with the most ROCK SOLID insurance company in all Kalimdor!! We would never need to be bailed out like other institutions."

Mackror: "ARGH NO!!! LIARS!!!!!" (eats bird)

Remember: In-game ads != during gameplay ads

[Legion_SB]

Nearly every discussion of in-game ads works under the assumption that in-game ads means ads plastered all over the game world.

This is true in some cases, but is a narrow view of the in-game ads concept as a whole.

There is a lot of real estate for ads to inhabit that is outside of the game world. Start-up screens (wedged between the ten different developer/publisher/middleware/etc splash screens). Menu areas (like the Samsung logo in the Perfect Dark Zero menus). Loading screens (like the Red Bull ones in Wipeout XL/2097). Downloadable content "brought to you by" on online marketplaces (that one's become common on Xbox Live). Community portals.

There's a lot of ways to introduce ads to games that don't involve splashing billboards all over a game world that shouldn't have them. Battlefield Heroes, for example, has ads all over, except in the game world itself.

Google's too big

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm finding another search engine. I know it sounds like an over reaction- but the way I figure it, the more funding google gets the more money it has to inject into tracking us and injecting ads into every possible place. I understand that whatever engine I use they're gonna spend money on trying to sell me something, or make something I will buy in the future- but I'd prefer to give my views to someone spending their money on something else. Naturally it's not gonna be microsoft- but its certainly not going to be google.
The question is: is it too late?
Anyone who uses mozilla uses google, google is now a VERB, they own youtube, and they serve ads on virtually every web page. On top of that, they're getting a base of users for their browser AND they have a suite of office applications.

People started saying when is too much a long time ago, well I think now.

Revenue shared between WHO?

[cliffski]

"The revenue will be shared"

between amazon and google. GREAT!!!!
then what's left will be given to the publisher who will make some deductions then give a small chunk to the developer.

Enough of this crap.

If you like a game, ANY game, then do the games industry a favour, and CUT OUT THE MIDDLEMAN. Many of the games on sale through online stores are also sold direct from the developer. If they offer that as an option, please take it. The developer will get between 2 and five times as much money from the sale. And you KNOW they got paid.

Middlemen are making more money from gaming than the developers who create them. This kind of bullshit is getting worse and worse.