The only ads in games I’ve ever been ok with were the ones in SWAT 4 where they just had dynamic textures that pulled different ads in so it was literally just like, decorative flyers on the walls were real ads instead of fake ones. Of course I could do with most the whole game braking 20 years later because the back end shit down thing.
There are more people making independent video games today than at any point in history.
I just don’t understand the all-or-nothing perspective that video game social media pundits have.
Personally, I absolutely prefer indie art films generally, but my preference doesn’t mean that Michael Bay blockbusters shouldn’t exist, or that Universal Pictures should go out of business…
Not everything needs to be for everyone, and most things created aren’t created for ME.
Honestly I’m for it. I hope all the major players adopt this so we can watch the pillars of the gaming industry collapse.
From the wreckage will be a renaissance of developers whose priority in making games is that they’re good.
I’m all for it. Everywhere there’s space for an ad to be blended into the background of the game to subliminally market to me should be utilized to its fullest.
The games will be free, right? The ads are what pays for it, right?
Advertising is brainwashing and should be illegal globally. No more ads!
There are better ways to finance stuff.
Once again, by decades long boycott of EA is paying off.
Public statements like this is why EA continually wins “Worst Company” over real assholes like Blackrock.
Do these execs really not grasp how many sales they slowly bleed by making modern triple A games unbearable…? Like they don’t actually have a captive audience, people can and do just play indie and old games instead.
Making games genuinely unbearable and pissing everyone off seems like such an obviously bad business decision, but being a VP requires being dumb as a brick I guess
Dost matter, they only estimate the pice of the game vs price of the game plus ad revenue, adjusted for maybe 5% missed sales. The highest number wins.
Person who has developed a service to put ads in games says companies should think about putting ads in games.
"EA Advertising is a platform that’s directly integrated into Frostbite, the engine EA uses to make its biggest games, from Madden to Battlefield. The idea is to streamline what’s required to create custom ads for clients and then track how players “engage” with the ads. “Advertisers can now collaborate with EA in a privacy-safe way to improve targeting and gain deeper campaign insights,” the company wrote last month. “EA ensures ads are viewable, delivered to real audiences, and measured using industry-accredited standards in partnership with Integral Ad Science.”
I never got into Android gaming because 90% of it is adware. If the PC landscape turns into this, you can bet your ass I’ll stop playing that as well.
Nobody owns “The PC Landscape” though, that’s the beauty. Steam has a large share, but even that is not completely unbreachable.
No one owns the Android landscape either
For different reasons than usual, this comment deserves the reply: “Let me Google that for you”.
(Or: Epic/Fortnite would beg to differ)
Why don’t you go ahead and do that and come back with some links.
Well the beauty of PC is that you could always jump ship to another distributor/developer if one turns into shit.
EA is already there, so it’s easy to play games from other devs instead XD
There are so many incredible indie games coming out these days too. Its just not worth buying the overpriced garbage big studios are trying con us into.
And if indie goes to shit too, we still have a solid 30 or so years of old games to play.
Microslop enters the chat…
LinuxDistros+Proton enters the chat…
I wont. There are thousands of good old games I’ve never played.
Games for android do exist that are good and bought outright. But not nearly as many as the other junk that’s out there.
For PC when I think ads in games I think sports games like ads in NHL rink boards and burnout paradise city.
I know they exist but I can’t be bothered to sort through the mountains of garbage to find them.
Definitely. Most I got were ones that I played on PC and had no idea android ones existed. Balatro is a good example. Knights of own and paper. And others.
I thought EA had already been doing this with need for speed all the way back in Xbox 360 times?
“Please normalize this and diffuse the backlash across the industry to it’s not just another thing people hate EA for.”
Ubisoft: “Way ahead of you, fam!”
I’ve sworn off game companies for less.
I don’t and won’t play games with in-game ads. No matter how good they apparently are otherwise, I’ll never know.
Only one I can justify is the EA sports games. Mainly because I refuse to play those games.
Ads are not required for sports to be immersive.
I was making a bad joke about they’re expected in sports games but I just refuse to play EA sports games in general.
I dislike how they’re all small iterations every year and filled with microtransactions.
But none intrusive banner ads is whatever, historically football games have included “fake ads” for charities and inclusion.
If that got changed to opt-in proper ads for a 10€ price deduction we’d be all ears
This is EA we are talking about, the “opportunity” is not to give the consumers a discount.
There are so few games I play in which ads would make sense. Hard to shoehorn a dorito ad in a fantasy universe or on a distant planet. I very much wouldn’t welcome it.
There are a few odd cases I can remember, like freaking Tonic Trouble ages ago that was another Rayman-like from Ubisoft and power-ups in that game (in Europe) were crunch bars from a vending machine. Or back when I played Splatoon they did an event in which you had to fight for a brand of noodles or some shit.
Oh yeah, there’s that absurd thing in Mario Kart 8 where they added 3 mercedes mini-cars out of nowhere. It’s terrible but also so stupid it’s a bit funny, especially since it’s the only product placement they ever did in that game.
Don’t forget the Monster energy drink in Death Stranding…
I’m pretty sure 90% of Fortnight characters are an ad now. Every real car in driving games like Gran Turismo is licensed and an ad. DotA2 did a Monster Hunter collab, which are basically ads.
Honestly I don’t even mind this kind of unintrusive ad. They can stay, and collabs can even be fun or enjoyable. That seems to be what they’re mostly talking about, alongside branded consoles to bring prices down. Or adding sponsored DLC to older games to bring back interest and make side money at the same time.
I think that’s the distinction here. If it’s something that fits naturally into the game and it’s part of the game, it’s ok. We’ve had this for years and nobody is complaining about it. But if they’re talking about animated banners or 30 second ad breaks between matches, they can fuck right off with that.
Early experiments included a custom Mountain Dew stadium “playable experience” in EA Sports College Football 26 and Visa branding in EA Sports FC.
"As we do these things, it’s ultimately around like, you know, are the players engaging with it? Are they talking about it? Is it ultimately leading to the brand being talked about and engaged in a positive way?”
I played Alan Wake (the first one) recently for the first time and was surprised to see Verizon billboards, Energizer batteries/flashlights and Lincoln cars in the game.
I personally didn’t mind it and treated it as an Easter egg opposed to an actual ad, if it were a pop-up or something that halted me in my place I would be annoyed sure but minor things like that kinda give it a bit of realism.
Note; I did want to link the Alan Wake x Energizer/Verizon/Lincoln collab here but then I got this pop-up on the first site that came up -
Pop-ups like this make me not want to use your product or service.
Edit; Kotaku didn’t care for my ad blocker so I’ll link them instead of fandom -
https://kotaku.com/alan-wake-remastered-is-ditching-the-energizer-batterie-1847658945
it’s not 90%, it’s 100%. Whenever a new movie comes out or a tv show is popular or a musician releases a new album…whatever there will be an in game “event” and new skins in Fortnite. it’s totally a free to play ad with microtransactions for said ads.
It’s like cartoons of the 80s and early to mid 90s. the cartoons themselves were just ads for the toys. I mean hell the first Transformers movie in the 80s was just a massive commercial to introduce the new toyline by quite literally killing off the previous line. And I for one loved it.
I mean is even Fortnite a game or a random Skinner box platform at this point? Can’t remember the last time I saw someone mention its gameplay.
To think there’s not a single billboard or radio ad in the Black Flag remake. All those missed opportunities…
Sea shanties of all your favourite radio ads.
1 877 ships for kids
Oh oh oh o’rielly’s pirate ship parts.
I HAVE DLC PAYMENT AND I NEED CASH NOW!
If you or a loved one have scurvy, you may be entitled to compensation.
I’m Wilford Brimley, and I have scurvy.
Had an accident at sea that wasn’t your fault?
What happened, EA? Did five minutes already pass before you gave everyone something to hate about your greedy, corporate, pulseless guts?
I swear, nobody can have any hobbies nowadays without execs enshittifying everything.
