Product Placement And Video Games
from the oh,-look-at-that... dept
You really can't escape advertising any more. It's absolutely everywhere. While the concept isn't all that new, it appears that the new fascination is on how to advertise within video games ("this frag brought to you by..."). Already, of course, automakers are huge fans of advertising in videogames. But, what's interesting about Viacom's announcement about their desire to advertise within video games is that it will convince many other companies they need to do the same thing. Of course, if the advertisers are paying for part of the game, shouldn't the games get cheaper for buyers?
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No Subject Given
And also be thankful for other sources of revenues, like ads, that allow them to keep the prices the same, grown their profits, and give raises to the hard working employees.
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Get off the crack pipe dude and go design a game that people want to buy.
Thankful ?
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I'll be the first to say...I doubt we'll see price
And they've been doing product placement in movies for quite some time.
If the same wisdom follows, there's simply no chance that games will get cheaper as a result of product placement. It probably won't affect game pricing in either direction. Despite ever increasing numbers of advertisements at my local theatre, the price for tickets actually went up to USD$9.00 from USD$8.00.
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bananas.
i bought some bananas at the grocery store last week. when i got home, i was disgusted to find movie ads on my bananas. little round stickers, about the same size as a Dole sticker, advertising a new movie that'll be out this summer. ugh.
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Its gotton worse elsewhere to, remember shopping malls those so called "public places"? Those places free from inturding ads? Well guess what now shopping malls are now advertising new shows on tv stations example: BIG HANGING SIGNS of Fox 61 advertising a new Fox show in Brass Mill Center mall.
before those stupid ads came in it felt like a public area where at LEAST you could get away from those advertisers but NOW? NOPE! Seriously I feel almost like a prisoner in that mall trapped by those ads.
Now about ads in video games COMPLETELY usless as in games such as Burnout 3 for its kinda hard to read an ad about FIFA or some other stuff going at least 150 miles per hour or more LOL UNLESS you slow down! well at least those are not as intrusive as the Cingular logo being pasted almost everwhere INCLUDING on the on screen graphic part in the NFS:Underground 2 demo included in the Burnout 3 game. (yes there is a demo of a game in a game to my wonderful suprise) However interestingly the Bayview Interstate highway direction signs the parts that are usually green are in fact blue which is kind of cool, sorry okay back on topic.
As for showing real brands in video games its kind of stealth advertising which makes the game seem more like a marketing tool rather than entertainment media. UNLESS its an offical game THATS DIFFERENT!
But my favorite type of "un-advertising" in an unoffical game is creating fake companies that look similar to real ones. Spoofing companies make creative logos that add interest in a game.
for example:
the first Driver game spoofed Union/Unocal 76 with a blue on orange square "69" sign you see in the games version of Los Angeles and in Driver 2 they spoof Coca-Cola in the New York New York attraction in its rendering of Las Vegas, in which it also has billboards sporting "Dinny's" a spoof of "Denny's"
Grand Theft Auto 3 and Vice City spoofed Gap with company names of "Zip" and "Gash".
I believe many other games "poke fun" at corporations and I have to say "why not?"
Its a free country.
point being, using real companies logos in an unoffical game is a marketing scheme, spoofing that companies logo in an unoffical game is an art form.
Now why, for that matter hasn't anybody played around with Mcdonalds' arches in making a game NOW that would be an interesting spoof.
BTW (In real life) I've found that ACTUAL REAL-LIFE billboard type ads ruin a vista and breakup the landscape into blight and cover-up whats wrong with this country.
Am I not alone?
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Yoshinoya which looks pretty fun. I wonder if this sort of game would be popular in North America..
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