Unneccesary, but whatever. :roll: So, you'd be okay with say, buying a new car and having adds painted on it for say, Coke, Nike, or whomever. OR maybe a TV that puts an add up on the screen for the first 5 seconds when you turn it on each time, or change the channel. Yeah, those are both rather extreme examples, but the idea still applies and as someone else posted earlier, this is how it all starts.
Regardless it's not that bad at all right now. Maybe when it gets like that than you'll have a just reason for stomping your feet about a fucking random poster you see for .5 seconds in a video game. I really don't get the problem with product placement. As long as the actors aren't sipping on a pepsi and saying how refreshing it is, what's the big deal? Games and movies are supposed to portray reality, and advertisements are a big part of the real world. Making fake advertisements is tedious and unneccesary when a company will pay you to put *actual* advertisements.
You must agree with me, and most others, that the fact that it sends your viewing stats back to a server is upsetting, and slightly scary. I don't mind a coke poster, or coke cans, or a computer screen that has gamefly on it in, in game. But, when there is a company monitoring how long you see the advertisements, and whatnot, its going too far
Not stomping ... just find it incredulous that this would seem like a "good idea" to a game maker for a "patch". And I don't know about you, but I play games/watch movies to get AWAY from reality. This is the same kind of crap TV stations have pulled. First it was a little logo in the corner, then it was a little logo with the occasional add in the corner, now its a banner add that takes up 1/4 of my screen telling me Monk is on Tuesdays at 9 for the 10th time this hour. Yeah, TV is free (some) but I "pay" by watching their two 30 seconds spots every 10 minutes. TNT is REALLY bad about this (just as an example). Anywho, slippery slope, Nixon, and all that crap .........
It does make me feel a little uncomfortable, but if they have the technology to see how good there advertisements are actually doing then *shrug*. With all the spyware now a days I'd rather see a simple poster than have a popup ad every 10 seconds
I took a marketing class and we watched a video that had all sorts of clips about advertising in movies. There are a bunch where the actors all sat back, cracked a coke and said "wow, nothing like sipping on a nice coca-cola." In some ways, that is realistic human behavior and I would consider it stealth marketing. Now, if the actors instead said "BUY COCA-COLA AUDIENCE!" then your going to see some major consumer backlash, but the marketing guys aren't dumb enough to do that. Also, that poster in Swat4 doesn't bother me so much. Its a semi-realistic addition to the environment. If it were in an alien space ship, then thats unrealistic and would definitely pull me out of the immersion and piss me off.
I have zero problem with creatively placed ads such as coke machines and the like if it's done within moderation. I do, however have a problem with an ad service being thrown into my game with no warning. What's next? Ads for viagra while I play WoW?
Even if it is suppose to portray reality, please tell me who has a poster that says "FREE TRIAL!!!! GOTO WWW.GAMEFLY.COM!!!!" in REAL LIFE?, Nose, do you have that poster or have you ever seen someone sporting that poster? I also dont like the idea that they added this content with a patch. That just sounds sketchy to me.
I don't know why this has sparked debate at all. Okay. You want to change a generic Cola machine to a coke machine? Cool. Whatever. It's there anyways, and it's not detracting from my immersion in the game, so I could care less. Ads like the Gamefly poster are obnoxious and detract from the game experience. (EDIT: To clarify, this would not be the case if Gamefly actually used such advertisements. But they don't, and we all know that, so it shouldn't be there if they're striving to create as realistic an enviroment as possible.) Bottom line. Having a choice solely between your computer upload marketing statistics and not playing the game you paid good money for? Bullshit. Slipping it in a patch and slying altering the Agreement? Regardless if it was their right to do so, it was exceptionally underhanded. "Though it obviously has the potential to be a problem, it's not a problem now, so I don't care" is an argument with all the strength of a kung-fu chop from a wheelchair-bound senior. It's not a valid argument because every evil, distasteful, wretched, or generally bad movement or thing had to start somewhere. Take a moment and reflect upon what World War II would have been like if everyone had that mentality? Ridiculous. How about this? Could you imagine looking at your doctor and saying, "Well, shit, I mean, if I'm only in the /early stages/ of cancer...." We generally try to defuse problems before they become bigger problems. There is a good reason for this. This obviously has the potential to be something bad, and I don't see anyone arguing that fact. So we're going to wait until it's gained enough momentum to be a signifigant problem, then we'll do something about it? That's idiotic logic, and I know that you're all intelligent enough to see that, so why is there any argument at all? Are you arguing solely for the sake of doing so? I don't get it. EDIT: You know what, screw it. I'm going to go and pirate every game that throws ads in there just for the sake of doing so. And I'm going to enjoy a Coke during the download. Mmm, nothing quite hits the spot like a Coke!
Did the price of your movie tickets go down when they started showing commercials prior to screenings?
I just saw the new Bat Man, had to sit through 10 minutes of fucking ads BEFORE the movie previews came on.
Now if they reduced the cost of the game and did this, I'd be cool with it. Otherwise, the fucknuts can go rail a tree. I don't want that shit in something I paid $50 for.
Need For Speed Underground 2 is also plagued with in-game ads. anything from restaurants (burger King) to retail stores (Best Buy).
