Kinda reminds me of how everyone thinks advertising doesn't work on them. Everyone likes to think they're very smart. Most of us aren't. And even those who are are usually smart in a very limited field.
I mean once you know some of the advertising tricks you break a lot of them.
A real good example of a lot of the tricks on show in just 1 single advert
Effect of Dunning Who-now?
Have been observing ppl smarter than me putting in the effort of late, as this topic has been growing only ever more relevant in recent years from social media reprogramming the mental fabric of society with hugely varying levels of subtlety, fueling a mostly fear-fueled obsession for learning the skills required to combat the increasing push of misinformation. So while I can't claim to be any good, there is at least more work being put into the implied "...yet!" But yeah, ppl have way too much unearned confidence in way too many areas of life. I do remember having confidence once though, before the horror of the alcohol and drugs wearing off up became a reality.
Twitter Blue Checkmarks.
One of the rules of keeping one was meant to be not tweeting information you know or suspect to be false so that created a degree of trust. That's been falling apart as not only are plenty of blue checks on twitter just liars / partisan spin doctors / partisan hacks but even media organisations have been getting fooled / not properly fact checking stuff.
I will absolutely bet you even as a baseline, you have seen an advert for something (say, a computer game, film, book) that you haven't seen before and checked it out as a result.
This is the most basic function of advertising after all: making you aware something exists that you can acquire. Persuading to buy one product over another, or to buy something a person otherwise not be interested in, etc. I suspect plenty of people are relatively resilient to.
Bit of a difference between targeted adverts and general advertising designed to influence desire.
Targeted =this info says this person is likely to like this product so all we do is make said product look good and they'll buy it.
General Influence = we don't have a target demographic or customer base yet but we need to convince people they need our product or want our product. Like say a toothbrush with tongue scraper on it
As an example
Advertisers getting targeting data would know to send me info on weird esoteric Sci-Fi stuff preferably with a decent amount of symbolism etc
Advertisers trying to sell a Sci-Fi film to general people would show it as a must see film that makes everyone feel happy or amazed with quotes about how you don't want to miss out.
The only time targeted advertising gets really sinister would be something like: When they know you and I tend to exchange replies quite often on here so they market the weird obscure Sci-Fi film to you in the hopes you'll then tell me about it at some point because you're a fellow poster telling me about the thing not a company so my guard will be less up when checking out the trailer.
Also with targeting they could apply more general stuff but that depends on the market they're in and the saturation in that market as some markets you just have to show people you exist and will see because the market is so underserved. E.G. Selling golf balls vs selling an AI controlled golf caddy troll that advises you on club choices and follows you round the course.
I know exactly the group of ads you're talking about and let me say that there are very few things I more passionately despise... and also, I kind of want to see if that game is as stupid as it looks. But I haven't broken yet.
I'll tell you the following based on some youtubers who looked into it
1) yes it's as stupid. No it's not that game it's almost never that game. It's usually some entirely different game
2) The reason for the ad is it's determined to be the most effective format even if under many regions rules those ads are outright lies
3) It's literally been determined and picked right down to the colours and styles to try and appeal to people with basically test groups being fed slight variations on the advert to test which is more effective.