Poll: Does labelled product placement in gaming bother you?

[babinro]

What are your thoughts on labeled product placement in gaming?

I consider my opinion to fall in the minority when I say that I'm perfectly find with it. This is true for all visual medium simply because it helps create a sense of immersion to the experience. If a scene involves a fridge opening and it contains generic unmarked bottles of liquids of various colours I can't help but laugh.

Let's use Fallout 3 as a general example:
- Suppose the Super-Duper Mart was actually Walmart
- Suppose Nuka-Cola was Coca Cola
- Suppose empty soda bottles were Coke products
- Suppose the pip-boy were made by Microsoft and had that brand etched along the side
- Suppose the 10mm rounds were branded by Remington

Would this ruin your experience? Enhance it? Indifferent?

 

[tippy2k2]

The more I think about it, the more I realize that I'm fine with it. I was thinking that in an atmospheric game that it would ruin the game but then I realized that the amazing energy given to you by the world's most trustworthy brand of battery Energizer did absolutely nothing to me in Alan Wake (A horror game where atmosphere is just about everything).

I suppose the only part that bothers me is that us gamers are not seeing any kickbacks for it. Madden 25 is a giant Snickers commercial sometimes yet it's still $60 (and no, that's not a shot on EA; EVERY game does this).

 

[Silvanus]

My only real experience of this was in BF2142, and it never bothered me one bit.

I had assumed it would, at least a little, but id didn't.

 

[Genocidicles]

I dislike it because it's so tacky, and it doesn't benefit me in any way.

Ads are only acceptable if it's a F2P game or something.

 

[Poppy JR.]

I never find it horrible, but if someone outright says "I bought a $5 sub at Subway's today!" and his friend exclaims "What a fantastic deal! And all under 200 calories!" Then I might groan a bit. Otherwise, depends on the level of corniness. If it feels natural and unforced I don't mind.

 

[BrotherRool]

I'm fine with it to a point, and that point is where it's inkeeping with the tone of the game. If drinking Pepsi gives you the best heal in the game, it's gone too far (or specifically, if a certain Toyota electric car gives your city simulation pure happiness without pollution). If they focus on it too long, so we've got cutscenes of people doing nothing but eating walkers crisps then it's too much.

It also doesn't work if it's asymetric. If coke is the only branded name in Fallout, then it's just weird and jarring. Especially if Fallout is meant to exist in an alternate world

 

[Tayh]

Heck no.
No, no, no.
I get enough of that crap in my real life.

There's no reason to host advertisements in a game, other than to go for a quick and easy cash-grab, with no benefits to the actual customers/players.
"Companies would pass on the savings to the customers," you say?
HA! I laugh in your face and at your naivety!

 

[TehCookie]

I don't mind it if it fits in. Using a brand name product in the place of a bland name product is fine, if I remember correctly in Burnout Paradise didn't that have real advertisements on their billboards? I didn't find that obnoxious or intrusive. If it's obviously shoehorned in it bothers me, like having a brown game with a bright colored Subway sign that clashes with the surroundings or people going out of their way to comment on X.

 

[FPLOON]

Whenever I think of "product placement", I always refer back to that one scene in Wayne's World...

Besides, how can I be bother by something that doesn't effect me in the slightest?

This whole comment was sponsored by a random product placement ad sponsored by captcha

 

[gmaverick019_v1legacy]

I don't mind it if it fits in. Using a brand name product in the place of a bland name product is fine, if I remember correctly in Burnout Paradise didn't that have real advertisements on their billboards? I didn't find that obnoxious or intrusive. If it's obviously shoehorned in it bothers me, like having a brown game with a bright colored Subway sign that clashes with the surroundings or people going out of their way to comment on X.

yup exactly, if it's something that would already probably be there but with "bland name insert here", then product placement doesn't bug me in the slightest. (such as a mountain dew can sitting on a table with two people chatting at a cafe, what's the harm in that?)


but if it's something that literally pops up during a loading screen or is just fucking super out of place, then hell no

 

[BearShark]

As long as it wasn't distracting and didn't interfere with gameplay, I really wouldn't mind.

 

[Grace_Omega]

Depends on whether the game is supposed to be set in our world or whether it's taking place in a fictional setting. In the example of Fallout I believe (correct me if I'm wrong) those games are supposed to be set in an alternate history so it would make sense to create fictional product and companies.

 

[Smooth Operator]

Ya it fucking does, I'm paying full price to then get ads that make the dev more money by shitting on my content... are you completely bloody mental.

But I don't expect people to get the point in an era where MS has you paying premium to then fill your console with ads, which is then described as an excellent service... when you train your monkeys well they will accept anything.

 

[Hero of Lime]

Product placement never really affects me in movies and television, and it never does so in video games either. Despite having some interest in advertising and marketing in a professional sense, very few ads actually make me want to buy the product in question. So no, product placements in games don't bother me. I don't play many games that include them anyway now that I think about it.

 

[Saelune]

When its blatantly about the advertisement, yes. When it grounds the world to be real to us, no. I know Coke, and Pepsi and McDonalds and all them. The book The Road had a part about drinking a can of Coke that would thus be a rare luxury in a post apocalyptic world, and I could understand it better, since Ive tasted a Coke. Never had a Buzz or Nuka Cola though. Sure they are Coca Cola parodies, but it loses its flavor (pun ).

 

[MeChaNiZ3D]

1. Not when it's done subtly and the game is set in the real world or similar.
2. Not when I don't know the product names.

 

[Frission]

I feels a bit cheap when that happens. I wouldn't hate the game, but it would leave a bad taste in the mouth, like if a band "sold out".

 

[jpoon]

It bothers me a bit. They're getting money from these companies and then they're charging you the same price for that game. Doesn't seem right to me at all.

Typically I will avoid any product I see in a game just to spite said advertising company.

 

[The_Echo]

It depends.

If it's set on Earth in a timeframe where you might find these things (modern or post-apocalypse), then I think it'd lend to a bit of... immersion? I guess?

Like, it never really bothered me that Metal Gear Solid features brands like Calorie Mate, Lucky Strike and iPod. Nor would it bother me if Fallout 3 had Coke bottles littered around. These are unobtrusive placements that you might not even notice right away.

But if they started playing straight-up ads on billboards in Ratchet & Clank or something, that'd be where I draw the line.