Coming to a game near you
Jul 12th, 2007 by admin
Well here is news that hasn’t come out of the E3 conference so far. It’s the latest trend in video games, and is on all the formats. If you own a Playstation, Xbox, Wii, or computer game you have seen the trend. It hasn’t reach the absolute annoying levels yet, but it’s coming. I’ll give you a hint, it’s the same thing that happened in movie theaters.
No idea? Well if you show up at a movie theater before you can see trailers for upcoming movies, and sometimes right after, you get commercials. I for one find that to be an incredibly annoying event. I hate it. I would like to punch the guy that came up with this idea in the face.
I feel similar to the person that came up with the thought of dropping ads into video games. Already huge sums have been spent to include ads in games, and that is the trend that is growing. Last year $370 million was spent to included ads in all manner of games, the expectation is that within 5 years it will be $2 billion. That’s a lot of money. Were I a video game software manufacturer I don’t know if I could say no, but I’d like to think I would.
The reason why is I don’t want
It’s not why I play. If I want to see a Coke ad, I’ll turn on a tv, look at a magazine, go to the movies or look at any number of websites. When I’m trying to enjoy a game, being immersed in its world, I don’t want to be reminded that I should buy some over priced sneakers, or that a cola company wants to see if I’m thirsty.
I don’t know of any gamer that enjoys the ads. I’m unaware of anyone, besides the advertisers, that think the inclusion is anything but intrusive and distracting. And they will be getting more so given time. It just irritates me.
If you don’t think it’s an annoyance, remember this post when you put in a new game, and before you can get it to load, you get a couple of ads to buy a Dell, or drive a Lexus, or eat at McDonald’s. Tell me how exicted you will be as you wait 30 seconds while you watch the ad, and then have to wait for the game to load. If you don’t think it could happen, check your DVD collection, or as I said above, go to a movie. It will happen.
If you don’t want to punch someone in the nose yet, I think you will. Or is it that as one of the original gamers (I’m about to be 40) I’m used to not having to deal with crap when I play a game to enjoy myself. Time will tell I suppose.
