I did a little thing on advergaming here, but this bit of news just came out a couple days ago with a new twist in the in game advertising business.. Here Adventuredesign

I always thought that's a great idea for advertisers, since games aren't so heavily advertised as TV. Adverts would actually get noticed and be part of the scenery, good adverts would actually improve the experience of the game IMO. I certainly plan to chase ingame advertising in my game whnever it gets finished! I've considered making it free to play but with ads - in theory that'll get more downloads which means it's more appealing to advertisers...

Quote: Original post by d000hg
I always thought that's a great idea for advertisers, since games aren't so heavily advertised as TV. Adverts would actually get noticed and be part of the scenery, good adverts would actually improve the experience of the game IMO. I certainly plan to chase ingame advertising in my game whnever it gets finished! I've considered making it free to play but with ads - in theory that'll get more downloads which means it's more appealing to advertisers...

Of course when the ads work every one will jump in and there will be just as many ads as there are on TV, the web and in magazines. Also what percentage of ads do you think are "good adverts" - personally I can't see the ad companies going out of their way to make better ads to appear in games than they do for other media.

In game advertising is the future. Expect to see it used extensively in the next gen consoles. And not just static ads. Changing ads based on sponsored tournaments, etc. This will become a huge revenue stream for the industry as gaming overtakes other forms of entertainment in popularity. TV just can't compete in the future of Tivo-like commercial skipping everywhere. Plus with online gaming you could theoretically log the number of "views" your ads get. When something like the Halo 3 world championships are played on Xbox live and you can have a couple hundred thousand people watching along and seeing the flash of a coke machine in the background as someone gets fragged we will start to become the sought after medium for advertisers.

Quote: Original post by Obscure

Quote: Original post by d000hg
I always thought that's a great idea for advertisers, since games aren't so heavily advertised as TV. Adverts would actually get noticed and be part of the scenery, good adverts would actually improve the experience of the game IMO. I certainly plan to chase ingame advertising in my game whnever it gets finished! I've considered making it free to play but with ads - in theory that'll get more downloads which means it's more appealing to advertisers...

Of course when the ads work every one will jump in and there will be just as many ads as there are on TV, the web and in magazines. Also what percentage of ads do you think are "good adverts" - personally I can't see the ad companies going out of their way to make better ads to appear in games than they do for other media.

But in theory you can censor who can advertise in your game (as a publisher or indie developer), to maintain a high standard of relevant or interesting adverts. Or would that just p*ss off the advertisers?

This is an interesting avenue to explore. I would think that the biggest advertisers would probably want exposure in branded/licensed games from the main developers at some stage, whereas, the smaller advertisers may look towards the smaller developers' games for exposure at less cost than other media, ya never know...some advertsers/producers in the future may approach a developer to make a game based on their product! (loo-roll anyone?).

Very interesting article. Product placement in games will probably increase since there isn't much right now. The best part of it all is definitley that the target groups are pretty clear.

Say that you are marketing a new cell phone directed at youths around 17 years old. Having a character in a best-selling game use the cell phone will almost be as effective as having TV or Radio ads. Maybe traditional ad channels should feel threatened?

Quote: Original post by sigmaent
Maybe traditional ad channels should feel threatened?

No. They'll just specialize, just as they have done throughout the history of the emergence of various media formats or transitions from broadcast to narrowcast models.

Television, which everyone sees as the biggest "victim," will change from a constant programmer-determined broadcast model to an on-demand narrowcast model, and advertisers will redistribute their television budgets as a small "listing fee" to be included in the interactive index and "consumer discounts" which reduce the consumer's media services bill by a small amount for each ad viewed.

Hey adventuredesign,
Adversiting Idea is really cool, but... It really means when your game becomes very popular.
How can you improve a game popularity?
What strategies would you apply for this task?

That's an interesting question. Adversiting is useless if your game gets a few audience. And that would happen if, despite of its quality, your company may offers it bad on wrong distribution chanels.
On Internet, how can you spread a game reputation? For expect more than 10000 viewers.

Speaking of games made from a product. A while ago there was a game called Chex Quest. Quite old now, but it's got Chex (cereal brand) all over it. Basically revolves all around their products.