Can misleading marketing be justified?

[gLoveofLove]

I was thinking about the AAA industry recently and how nice it would be for some companies to shake up their existing franchises a bit. So my question is: Is it ever ok for a company to hide or change what its game is like in order to surprise their players.

So I'm sure we all remember Metal Gear Solid 2; switching out Snake for Raiden.
For example, up until the release of the new Zelda game we only see Link, but then after you've purchased the game you find out that you only play Link for the first half hour and then Zelda becomes the sole playable character. Or perhaps early on in the story, Link gets captured; thrown into the dungeons; has to escape; and then the game's structure becomes an enclosed, linear one. Rather than traversing a giant open kingdom, you are now fighting for survival in a much more straightforward and smaller environment. However the reason they did this wasn't because they wanted the game to sell more or that making the entire game that big would be too expensive and difficult, but because they genuinely wanted to shake up the Zelda formula and surprise their audience- like a plot twist, but an incredibly early one.

As another example- let's say that in trailers 80% of FFXIII's footage was from Pulse. I think many people would call that dishonest and unethical, but at what point does it become alright? How much Cocoon gameplay needs to be shown, and how much Pulse gameplay can be shown?
So is it alright for a company to hide significant aspects of their games even though it could be claimed that the consumers paid for the product expecting something else?

 

[False Messiah]

I think it's fair game to play with the narrative of a game, throw in an early plot twist where you have to fight zelda instead of saving her is fine. But if you start to change the mechanics of the game you'll set up people for disappointment.

You could look the same way at books, if it said that the story is about a hero fighting a villain in a steam punk world it's fine to twist the plot and show that the villain was framed all along. It's not fine to suddenly make it a medieval setting or change from novel to a series of haiku's.

Edit: and now I have to write a steampunk story consisting purely of haiku's, brb.

 

[Maximum Bert]

Im sure they can justify most things except blatant outright lying legally. Ethically however certain marketing strats are far more shady but then again I dont think they care any more than they are forced to in regards to ethics especially in big business.

 

[nomotog_v1legacy]

It will make people mad some times and if that is what you want to do, then it's cool. I just attach the caveat that you should have a point when you mess over your players. Do it for a purpose other then money. People still might not like it though. If your looking for a reason no one will complain about, then your not going to find one.

 

[Smooth Operator]

If we run it by the book misleading advertisement is straight up illegal. But in the real world you will almost never be able to prove anything in court on grounds of advertisement, except in cases where companies sell you numerical specifics. If a box said there are 3 oranges inside and there were only two then and only then do you have a solid case.

So the effect of that is you can not ever trust a single word of advertising because they are not actually legally bound to tell you real information. This is why we have reviews and that is why I will say very harsh things about reviewers who bullshit the audience.

 

[ExDeath730]

If we run it by the book misleading advertisement is straight up illegal. But in the real world you will almost never be able to prove anything in court on grounds of advertisement, except in cases where companies sell you numerical specifics. If a box said there are 3 oranges inside and there were only two then and only then do you have a solid case.

So the effect of that is you can not ever trust a single word of advertising because they are not actually legally bound to tell you real information. This is why we have reviews and that is why I will say very harsh things about reviewers who bullshit the audience.

Actually...Here in Brazil, we have something in Consumerist Law called the Principle of Information. As most principles, it is something ingrained in the law, and that the judge must use to cases involving misleading advertisement. Just so people here understand, in Brazil we use Roman Law, what this means is that we have big books of law, called Codes, where there are laws divided in articles and that the judges must abide by while deciding (they can go around it, when it's an anomaly, but every decision must have a base in the laws and principles). Anyway, by this principle, any information and advertisement for a product whatsoever MUST be true, if it isn't the company who put the advertisement must change it to the truth, and compensate the wronged party in damages. If possible the product must comply to what was advertised.

Obviously a decision about this would only have reach here in Brazil, and someone would have to go to court first about this, and in this case, the second possibility would be insane and impossible, so it would be only about the damages and a change of advertisement here. We had some stuff about this before in the internet, usually against Google, but they caved pretty fast to conform with the law, after the judge decided to ban Google from the country if they didn't.

 

[CaitSeith]

As far as I'm concerned, plot twists don't count as misleading marketing (unless they promise "no plot twists"). I think it was justified in Spec Ops: The Line (where even the demo didn't reflect the true core nature of the game). Unfortunately as a selling strategy it was counterproductive.

 

[Pyrian]

Advertising things that aren't in the game? Bad. Not advertising things that are in the game? Fine.

 

[fix-the-spade]

Of course misleading advertising can be justified.

When you use it, you get more money.

Trying to moralise about such things is futile, industry leaders generally are so far removed from their customers and the end product that they have no idea if they're telling the truth or not to begin with.

 

[Redd the Sock]

What you are describing is rather problematic. It isn't as though you would need to bury something like FF6's world of ruin or symphony of the Night's inverted castle to market the game, yet they function as good twists. What you describe is a deception about the game you are trying to sell because you don't think they game you made will sell without lying to the people about what it is about. MGS2 was a flawed game, but it might have gone down easier if we knew going in Snake's a side character to Raiden's story.

If you have to plot twist your way into writing a different story than what your fans expect, you're doing something wrong.

 

[Pirate Of PC Master race]

Of course misleading advertising can be justified.

When you use it, you get more money.

Trying to moralise about such things is futile, industry leaders generally are so far removed from their customers and the end product that they have no idea if they're telling the truth or not to begin with.

Seconded. Especially if you can get away with it.

Any advertisement is still the showcase from the best part of the game.
I wouldn't trust any info if they are trying to sell me something.

 

[Mutant1988]

Advertising things that aren't in the game? Bad. Not advertising things that are in the game? Fine.

This.

It's not misleading to not tell people of features and narrative devices. It is misleading to promise actual identifiable features that aren't actually in the product.

 

[Cette]

Misleading people on the plot of a game is fine but misleading them on the gameplay is not.

So protagonist misdirect on MGS2 ok. Making people think Brutal Legend was a hack and slash rather than a half assed RTS not ok.

 

[MetalDooley]

Depends really.If it's something like you described with MGS 2 then I've no problem as it's akin to a movie studio not revealing the big plot twist in the trailers.Personally I'd love Nintendo to do something like you mentioned where Zelda turns out to be the hero and rescues Link(can imagine the whining though)

On the other hand if it's something like Aliens:Colonial Marines where all the gameplay footage shown prior to release turned out to be way better than what was actually released then it's a problem as they pretty much flat out lied to make the game seem way better than it was

 

[Mutant1988]

Depends really.If it's something like you described with MGS 2 then I've no problem as it's akin to a movie studio not revealing the big plot twist in the trailers.Personally I'd love Nintendo to do something like you mentioned where Zelda turns out to be the hero and rescues Link(can imagine the whining though)

On the other hand if it's something like Aliens:Colonial Marines where all the gameplay footage shown prior to release turned out to be way better than what was actually released then it's a problem as they pretty much flat out lied to make the game seem way better than it was

That was pretty blatantly a case of them hiring a B-team to do all the real work, then putting their A-team on making the material for the trailers once it became apparent that they got exactly what they paid for from the B-team - Which was not anywhere as good as the marketing department had been told.

All the while Gearbox were taking all the credit for this awesome game that's going to be totally awesome you guis, only to back pedal like crazy once it bombed.

'course, even had Gearbox done the actual work I'm sure it would have been awful - Just look at the garbage that is Duke Nukem Forever.

That was pretty blatantly a case of false advertisement and gross developer and management incompetence.

 

[MirenBainesUSMC]

False advertisement sucks but I figure its merely part of game selling, the dev does his poker play to see if you'll bite and buy the extra edition or resist and call the bluff, waiting to actually see the product. Is it fair? So far as I can tell there is nothing illegal written in the books about it and its a more of a psychological play on consumer's choice to buy day 1 or wait for its reviews after the fact and gameplay vids.

Aliens Colonial Marines was one of them. That was probably the worst offender in recent memory.

What I don't care for is selling games in ads in which they use PC graphics -- then you find the images aren't as smooth as presented in the console version you buy. Now that is F'd up.

 

[vast-enemy]

I saw an add for The Witcher 3 on youtube today, and it used 60FPS footage to advertise The Witcher 3 on Xbox, which the consensus believes will run at 30fps. Anyone who knows games, knows the difference between 60 & 30FPS is night & day. I think that's a good example of deceptive advertizing.

Sometime ago I bought Colonial Marines when it 1st came out, and OMG it was nothing like the footage that preceded it on youtube. It was terrible in fact, but what can you do?

 

[viranimus]

Better question is can marketing be justified, which when you get it down to its core, it cannot.