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Publishers Detail Specific In-Game Ad Plans For Future Games
Posted by
Soulskill
on Sun Dec 14, 2008 02:44 AM
from the just-what-i-never-wanted dept.
from the just-what-i-never-wanted dept.
MTV's Multiplayer Blog recaps a recent event held by Massive Inc., a subsidiary of Microsoft, during which game publishers put forth specific ideas on what types of in-game advertising players will and won't be seeing in the near future. The examples varied in how interactive and intrusive they were, from name-brand bottled water power-ups to destructible virtual billboards to taking advantage of sports game locker rooms for product placement. They did claim they would restrain themselves from blatant advertisements that would ruin immersion in fantasy games. Blizzard partnered with Massive to bring ads to Battle.net, but don't expect to see ads in the associated games.
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So long, game publishers. (Score:5, Insightful)
>>...what types of in-game advertising players will and won't be seeing in the near future
Hey, game publishers, let me tell you what types of in-game advertising I'll be seeing in the near future: NONE! Know how I know? because I WON'T BE BUYING YOUR PRODUCTS! Seriously. It's the reason I quit watching television several years ago: it was bad enough that the quality of the shows was weak, but the encroachment of pervasive, obvious product placement and obnoxious on-screen banners thoroughly ruined the experience.
I play games to escape from this garbage, not to endorse it. I'm not interested in your advertising, and as of late I'm barely interested in your cookie-cutter games that are big on cost & hardware requirements and poor for overall entertainment value. You're walking a fine line, already.
What I'm saying is, you need to focus on the basics -- creating games that are fun and deliver good value -- rather than considering my eyeballs some sort of resource that you get to exploit.
Pissing off your customer base is not the road to financial success. But what do I know? I'm only the person who used to buy your products. And I suspect there are many, many more people who share my sentiments.
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Is calling it nuka-cola instead of coke-cola is really going to ruin your game of fallout 3? Yeah, I didn't think so.
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Re:So long, game publishers. (Score:4, Interesting)
Is calling it nuka-cola instead of coke-cola is really going to ruin your game of fallout 3? Yeah, I didn't think so.
Is coca-cola really going to let the game developers allow their drink give you radiation poisoning?
I looked at doing ads in games once, and the real problem was that the advertisers weren't happy to merely see their products in the game, but rather the product placements had to be positive, and on message, and they wanted exclusivity so no competitors products... maybe the climbate has changed since then but I doubt it.
I mean, there was that huge Dodge Ram tie in with the new season of Terminator/SarahConner, and you can sort of see the same sort of placement 'control' going on. I suspect the script writers weren't allowed to write a scene where that truck gets toasted... that would be 'off message'. Dodge Ram's are safe, reliable, indestructable -- they aren't going to pay you for product placement, and then have it not start, or blow a tire, or crash...
In a game its even worse, because not everything is scripted. So while Nuka-Cola can give you radiation poisoning, Coca-Cola won't buy into that. The game becomes souless because the advertisers won't pay to associate their product with something negative.
Frankly, I'm surprised EA manages to get the exotics to sign on for some its Need for Speed outings. As much as they thrive on the dreams of street racing, they tend to avoid any official endorsement of it. Plus with NFS my understanding is that EA is paying the manufacturers, not the other way around.
Meanwhile Grand Theft Auto IV has 'Comets' instead of 'Porsches'. I'm not sure if the reason is that EA has soem sort of exclusivity, so the manufacturers can't license them, or whether the manufacturers are turning them down due to the level of criminal/violent content, or whether GTA isn't simply isn't asking because it doesn't want to pay?
I'm also curious what the situation is with military hardware/weaponry -- does a title like Rainbow six have to license the various rifles and pistols, etc? Or the rights to use an Apache / Comanche / Blackhawk...?
Parent
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Meanwhile Grand Theft Auto IV has 'Comets' instead of 'Porsches'. I'm not sure if the reason is that EA has soem sort of exclusivity, so the manufacturers can't license them, or whether the manufacturers are turning them down due to the level of criminal/violent content, or whether GTA isn't simply isn't asking because it doesn't want to pay?
I would guess that it's because GTA is, and always has been, satire. The entire world is a parody of ours- real products would ruin the effect.
So long??...Just MOD out the advertisements... (Score:4, Insightful)
The reason the GTA series was unable to obtain a license to model the games cars and name them after real world cars was because none of the car manufacturers wanted to see their car associated with not just violence....but they refused to allow an in game model of their be susceptible to any sort of damage. This has been documented in the past before not mostly with the GTA franchise, but with every racing franchise in history.
It's the reason why in the Gran Turismo (racing series on SONY platforms) they have a complete licenses to use exact replicas of hundreds of real life cars from dozens of competing auto companies. It's because the GT producers and developers SIGNED a contract stating that no cars could be damaged in the game by the player. That's why in GT you can ram cars into walls, drive 130 MPH head on into another car, and nothing happens to the car or the player. This is all intentional in order to obtain the license to use the car brand names.
This goes even further with sports games. Nothing controversial can ever be allowed in sports game that use the official Major League Baseball, NFL, NBA, etc. license. No players can get kicked off the team for shooting themselves in the leg (Plaxico) or hosting an illegal dog fighting ring (Vick) or beating their wives (B. Myers) or using steroids (half of MLB).
Metal Gear Solid 4 had an item called 'Playboy' that you could use to distract enemy soldiers with who would read the magazine instead of fighting you. In game advertisement? Sure. Distracting? Not really. Because it's a natural element to the game, magazines have been in MGS before.
Would seeing COCA COLA and PEPSI banners inside the sports stadiums of sporting games really put people off this badly that they would stop playing games? I wouldn't think so. Most people who play sports games watch sports, and sports have the most advertisements per minute of show than any other television genre.
But...would I want to see giant banners for PEPSI or DORITOS in GTA4, or Fallout 3? No. Because they would seem so out of place and would detract very much from the game.
But those advertisements could be REMOVED on the PC versions. Don't like that PEPSI ad? Replace it with a picture of your girlfriend by substituting some texture or .img files in the director the game is in. Or create an advertisement free mod of the game. I'm sure it would be the most popular mod. Consoles gamers (I am one, and a PC gamer) will get stuck with commercials but PC gamers hopefully can just MOD advertisements right out of most games.
Parent
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You are just screaming in the wilderness. Over half the players out there have an I.Q. below 100, live in suburbia, and won't care.
I would think that a nascar game without ad's will (Score:2)
I would think that a nascar game without ad's will be out of place maybe you can have fake ad's / ad's for other games in it but real ad's will fit in other sports are the same way.
Further the gap (Score:4, Insightful)
True, modern DRM is a bit more difficult than flipping JNE to JE, but that just goes in the favor of the pirates; the ad-download function can't be more difficult than the DRM, and they're already quite able to remove the DRM... So, yeah, publishers, go ahead and compete yourself out of the market.
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That was the first thing I thought of too. I mean it is bad enough that companies like EA are making the DRM so damned nasty that you would have to be nuts to install it, but now they are going to pile on the ads(and if you think they won't just wait until the bean counters see how much more they can "monetize the IP") which of course will be stripped out of TPB version.
Oh, and let us not forget that they will probably add "video billboards" or constantly updating ad content which means they will be sucking
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EA is laying people off. Has it occurred to anyone that given the rate of piracy of any decent game that charging for the game itself isn't such a good business model anymore?
If adds can start to support some of the development costs of AAA titles we may start to see more dare taken in their design. As is who's willing to spend millions of dollars to develop these titles when they're not 'sure things'? Video games are falling into the same problem that Movies have.
Anarchy Online (Score:2)
If more vendors had jumped into the advertising and maybe tried a few clever/entertaining ideas I'd have no problem with it.
Sometimes, they can be alright (Score:2)
In Battlefield 2142 they put ingame adverts in, but they actually didn't detract from the game - they were simply on billboards in urban settings, and made the place seem MORE real that adverts for "Generic Corporation". However, it needs to be done very carefully to avoid ruining the game's atmosphere, and I do agree that ingame adverts should be recognised in an appropriate discount on the game itself.
Banners in FSX (Score:3, Funny)
Does this mean I must now carry a trailing banner with my Piper Cub in Flight Simulator?
Re:A reasonable idea (Score:5, Insightful)
No, it's not fair. I'm paying for the game. My time is valuable, and it is not for sale to advertisers. When they give me the games for free, they can put in ads. Until then, I don't want advertisements of any kind, and I will not buy any games from any company which sells them.
Parent
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Re:A reasonable idea (Score:5, Informative)
Like I said to another poster- name one time that a company has ever lowered prices because they started accepting ads. They either go free and sell ads, or they keep the price exactly where it is. If they already know you will pay x for a game, they have no reason to charge less than x. They'll keep charging the same amount and make that plus the ad money.
And no, I still wouldn't buy it. I wouldn't boycott the company if they were upfront about it, but I would never buy anything with ads in it. I'd rather support products that don't do that bullshit.
Parent
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Newspapers depend on ads to make the price low enough for people to afford them. But I bet most /.-ers never read a newspaper because they get all the news from the web. For free. Payed by advertizers.
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Actually I stopped buying newspapers because they were so many ads. I'd happily pay a few bucks for one, especially with good investigative reporting. But I won't pay a damn cent for one with them. There's also several magazines of various genres that I used to subscribe to, but no longer do due to ads. As for the online versions- there's ads on the internet? Haven't seen one in years, thank you AdBlock.
The most insidious thing about ads- they really don't lower your price. The companies that take o
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That's a good point that I hadn't considered. I must say it would be nice to walk through a city in a game and see real ads, as long as they don't interfere with the gameplay. Thay make the game more 'real' if done well.
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*cough*BF2142*cough* While I can see a handful of Indie publishers moving towards the play-for-ads model, the big publishers will never do that. It has been interesting though to see all of the ad-supported net games out there. Yeah they are pretty lame usually and churned out by some Chinese script-shop, but still interesting...it means there is a viable business model there.
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Riiight. Because Blizzard making $10-15 per month per subscriber doesn't add up.
I recently quit WoW, but during the over 3 years I played I paid about $650 in monthly fees and a grand total of $90 for the game itself.
Players are willing to pay monthly to play online.
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I will accept a game that has billboards with ads for Coca-Cola -- if and only if that same game, in the same play session, also contains billboards with ads for Pepsi.
That would be realistic, and would therefore add to immersion and enhance the game.
What, the Coca-Cola marketing board don't like the idea? Too bad. I guess I won't play that game then.
If you spend your time in one stadium (Score:2)
I will accept a game that has billboards with ads for Coca-Cola -- if and only if that same game, in the same play session, also contains billboards with ads for Pepsi.
I guess that means you won't play any simulations of professional sports. As I understand it, each sporting event has only one soft drink sponsor: usually either Coke, Pepsi, or DPSU. Nor will you play theme park simulators in the vein of Sim Theme Park or Roller Coaster Tycoon, as each amusement park also has one soft drink sponsor (e.g. Coke for Indiana Beach or Pepsi for Cedar Point).
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Re:A reasonable idea (Score:4, Insightful)
I want to tell you to get off the soap box, but you're partially right. The in-game ads in Guitar Hero III were completely immersion-breaking for me. It's a small part of why I've stopped supporting that series.
Advertisements don't always break immersion though--series like Madden and Tony Hawk would be really cheesy if they lacked ads for real products/companies like what you would see in a real football/skateboarding arena. I don't have a problem with publishers capitalizing on this, and it would be insane to expect them not to.
Also, the banner ads in the Battle.net lobbies never bothered me very much--I'd get into a game and forgot about them.
Parent
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I don't care about immersion. I hate ads. These companies have no right to waste my time dealing with them. I do not and will not support any company which sells ad space on paid products. If I'm paying for it you have no right to do so.
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Actually, they do have the right. You are not being forced to play their game. If you don't like where the commercial gaming industry is going, lend a helping hand to bring the free software gaming scene up to speed :)
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I do not and will not support any company which sells ad space on paid products. If I'm paying for it you have no right to do so.
Cable television operators sell ad space on paid subscriptions to basic cable. So I guess you canceled cable television, and you're on DSL or dial-up now, right?
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Here's where I disagree though...if you purchase a game, knowing full well that it contains ads, well...that would be kind of your fault for deciding to purchase it. It is their game, and if they want to sell it with ads that is fine, but we have the right to vote with our dollars.
Now what I find unacceptable is when a company pulls bullshit like EA did with bf21
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"I mean does anyone get mad over seeing a billboard or some ads on a bus?"
I, for one, do.
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I'm mad the city uses buses for revenue, but the school buses do not. The school needs money a lot more than the city does...
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Yeah, they should put billboards in the classrooms, placement ads in schoolbooks and have sponsored classes.
Hi children, this English class is brought to you by McDonald's.
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The in-game ads in Guitar Hero III were completely immersion-breaking for me. It's a small part of why I've stopped supporting that series.
I've gold-starred all of easy, all of medium except [tier 8, Don't Hold back, FCPREMIX, TTFAF], five-starred tier 1-6 on hard and at least half the bonus tracks with ~15 gold stars, and I'm only Raining Blood and Battle With Lou short of completing expert.
I haven't noticed any ads.
(except during startup; you pseudo-skip those by aggressively hitting the fret buttons, and they happen pre-immersion).
I could go look for them, but I prefer living in blissful ignorance. I hope I can even though I know they're
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Really? I didn't even know that half of the amps and such were actually branded... I thought they were just made up. Seeing branded guitars and such in a music game isn't so much of a problem. Guitar Hero: World Tour, however, was littered with needless shots of KFC buckets, AT&T billboards, and other distractions that only serve to date and cheapen the game itself. If they wanted to advertise for KFC in the game, they should have had Buckethead as a playable character. :P
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OK then, but that precludes you from enjoying magazines, newspapers, subscription television, sporting events, travelling on a bus, driving past billboards, going to the cinema, going to a pub, or buying anything from the Internet.
In fact, if you do a single one of these things, ever, then you're a hypocrite. Looks like you're going to have a very limited existence.
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Real classy.
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BWHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
You actually think that it will lower game costs? Please show me one time in the past 20 years when a company creating a new line of revenue means they actually reduced prices on other lines. Just one. This won't make games any cheaper or any better. And because it means companies will be spending more money on advertising (which creates no useful goods or services) the companies that advertise will raise prices. This will cost you, not save you.
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CDs cost a fraction of what cassette tapes cost to manufacture, yet it took 15 years for CDs to come down in retail price to the inflation adjusted point of cassettes.
The point is, companies will simply take that extra money and shove it in their pocket. Consumers won't see any benefit from it.
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No, I don't. I don't have satelite TV. But if I was to get it- I'd happily pay more for an ad free version.
And no, cable/satelite wouldn't cost more if there were no ads. Why not? Because they already charge what the market will bear. If they raised prices, they'd lose more money from loss of subscribers than they'd gain in revenues. If that wasn't true, they'd raise prices even with the ads. The idea that the ads actually make things cheaper shows a complete lack of understanding of economics.
Re:A reasonable idea (Score:4, Interesting)
Well, you should be able to. There should be a "Warning: Contains Marketing" statement, alongside the warnings about violent content or bad language.
Personally I'm far more concerned about our children being exposed to marketing in video games than I am about violence or anything else that the media have moral panics about. Childhood exposure to Coca-Cola marketing and McDonalds marketing is the direct cause of many serious health problems. Childhood exposure to nipples has not been proven to have any negative effect at all (in fact, breastfeeding proponents seem to argue it's a good thing). So the ESRB and their counterparts in other countries should be putting a very prominent warning on the packaging when a game contains these nasty messages that are teaching our children to poison themselves.
Parent
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Clearly the ESRB warning should mention stuff like that.
Rated T for Teen
Contains: Drug References, Fantasy Violence, Suggestive Themes, Commercialism.
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"Fact"? What "fact" is this? The publishers may have claimed that the ads will not be intrusive, but just saying something doesn't make it true. Marketers are lying scum, and like all liars, the things they say tend not to be true.
The fact is that advertisements and product placement are nearly always intrusive.
You insensitive clod... (Score:2)
Pirates are important for maintaining a natural balance and fighting global warming.
I bet you are one of those pajama-wearing-ninja-lovers too.
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I wouldn't worry, they're only looking for an excuse [slashdot.org].