Poll: Does labelled product placement in gaming bother you?

[FrozenLaughs]

In games where it makes sense it doesn't bother me. Sports, Racing, and open city games it is fine. The same advertising is present in real life, and it helps draw me into the feeling of really being there in the game.

Shoehorned into other genres it gets annoying. I don't want Master Chief drinking Mountain Dew, eating Doritoes or driving a Chevy Warthog.

 

[Azkar Almsivi]

It doesn't bother me at all, it doesn't kill my immersion and some of the ads in Rainbow 6 Las Vegas were actually fairly funny.

 

[Dragonlayer]

Not in the slightest.

In fact, I find my immersion somewhat slightly damaged by made-up products, especially if those games are supposedly set in real life locations. Mmmm, can't wait to get me some of that blatantly Not-Cola!

Now obviously I draw the line at the possibility of a future COD experience where my orders are interrupted mid-firefight to extol the virtues of some brand of life insurance or if I'm stalking some cannibalistic bandits in the The Last of Us DLC and they talk at length about how sturdy Dude and Dudeson's TM brand of 2X4s is (great for caving in the human skull!), but I am yet to see a game with such heavy handed marketing, or indeed, where a real life product was vital to game progress.

Incidentally, people keep talking about Energizer batteries in Alan Wake but I never saw any: did they censor the Australian version or something?

 

[Torque2100]

Product placement is something that I have never been bothered by. Unless it's really blatant and in your face, like the a character in a film using a product and then reciting the latest marketing slogan about it. In my opinion, seeing a recognizable product in a film or video game set in the present or near future gives the setting much more authenticity than some made up brand or just a plain white box labeled "corn flakes."

 

[aozgolo]

I can really only forgive it in sports titles such as racing games that are built on brand recognition and so on, if you're talking about something like a Coca Cola can on someone's desk, or a TV that airs advertisements for real product, no I don't really care for that.

 

[Andy of Comix Inc]

Product placement as okay as long as it makes sense. For example, in Deus Ex: Human Revolution, there are ads for Coke and such lying around, as well as other Square Enix titles. Games with in-game billboards for real brands can also lend credibility to an open-world, like in Driver: San Francisco.

There are places where real-world branding can enhance the fiction, and I welcome that. There's nothing inherently scummy about it. If it at any point starts to degrade the fiction instead, though, I think that's a point where it has failed to do its job. Besides. Advertising is at its most effective when you're not paying attention, right? Like people turn off to "ads", but not to ads, if that makes sense. So I can't really think of any prominent examples of it done "wrong". I think ad people understand their art (and it is an art) too much to screw it up.

 

[SomeGuyOnHisComputer]

It doesn't bother me as long as it's just that, product placement. As soon as an internet connection is required so my game can be interrupted for streaming ads, that's when I have issues. If a character in s game is sipping on a Coke, I don't see why that would bother anyone. Sometimes it even adds to the charm of the game, like Crazy Taxi, or various racing sim games.

 

[CpT_x_Killsteal]

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?

I think prominently displaying the brand names would give me the shits. It just reeks of being a total shill and making cash grabs.

However, if it were just a few little obscure things that most people wouldn't spot unless they were looking closely for no real reason, then I'd be fine with that.
But running around with my a game that constantly reminds me "SPONSORED BY BRAND NAME" would make me take the game back for a refund.

And it's not like they're not already making ridiculously disgusting cash grabs and I just don't want to play half the games. It feels like doing so would involve submerging myself in sewage because of how dirty the money making schemes are.

 

[Apl_J]

If it fits with the theme, then why not. A few real adverts in a setting meant to seem like the real world only help sell the illusion.

But do I need a McDonalds branded soda cup in Final Fantasy? Hell no.

 

[somonels]

Like Jim constantly reminds us, we can't trust these companies. We should not believe that the extra money they make is used for anything other than investor dividends and gold plated shoes for executives.

I don't see how masquerading video games off as a reality or even pseudo reality is a good thing, not to say it can't be, but it just isn't always. We can also ask why should the can be of coca-cola? What difference does it make? Usually none. It just gives them that bit of extra money they think they deserve, and that expectation will bleed over to other games and companies until they feel justified with either raising the prices or pushing more marketing in. In time the lines between game and marketing channels begin to blur and we are better off never reaching that point.

 

[SinisterGehe]

This depends to me in the sense of context.
If it is a game based on reality and wants to give the milieu of the future, present of recent past of it. Then it is ok, it makes sense.
But if it is alternative reality (I think I need to clarify: By this I mean that the 'timeline' of major events have followed the history we know) - then it starts to be on shaky ground depending on when the timeline got turned off the rails.
When it is Scifi or fantasy purely, nothing to do with our world. Then it is 100% developers have to go to a corner and be ashamed - or the whoever was responsible usually the financier or publisher.

But I think scenarios like these would never happen, that a game turns into advertising platform (Well maybe sports games - they are moving billboards already), maybe they might show a certain brand or items. But if shooters aren't allowed to add Colt weapons into their games because they are afraid of copyright.

The line can be drawn but it is very shaky.

 

[Azwrath]

Yes, but not right away. I mean in your example nuke cola is pretty iconic to fallout so it would be stupid to change it but if it never had Nuke Cola i guess it would not bother me that much. On the other hand there's something really lame to seeing the words Microsoft each time i look at my pipboy. I feel it would just send the wrong message.

What would really scare me tho is the way such a system would be abused. Just imagine EA games. They already have shameless product placements in games like sims and simcity. If this were allowed on a full scale their games would just be hours long promotional slots. And i'm sure they would still ask full price.

 

[GundamSentinel]

In general I wouldn't mind. But there is such a thing as 'too much'. If a game is very in-your-face about it, it would start to get annoying (like people talking about the brands or quests involving the brands ('The Coca Cola Challenge')).
Also, it has to make some sense, in-game. Some far-future alien civilization shouldn't have Microsoft ads.

Other than that, I have no real problem with it. It might in fact enhance the experience. I always hate to use the word 'immersion', but there it is.

 

[mirage202]

Depends for me.

If I'm roaming around and see something I recognise it's like "Heh cool, can of Coke"

Bits that get thrown in and say shit like "Hey you should totally check of BestBuy" then no, that's not ok.

 

[Doom972]

I don't mind it in free-to-play or low budget games, because in that case it's necessary for the game to exist. If it's in a AAA game, I find it very insulting because it's not like they need the extra money for the game to be profitable.

 

[putowtin]

If it makes sense, a football game has ads, that makes sense, after all it there in real life. How ever try sneaking that in to Mass Effect or Skyrim were gonna have trouble!

 

[Fireaxe]

Deus Ex: Human Revolution had some, which I didn't mind -- I mean you can't walk around some city blocks without seeing adverts in reality so it's not like they're an immersion breaker or particularly game altering, and given I bought the game for like 20 bucks and well and truly got that value and then some from it I don't really object to some unobtrusive advertising being in there.

 

[likalaruku]

Yeah, I guess it depends. It would have to be made up entirely of products I already like & companies I don;t actively hate, & I'm f**king picky.

My favorite sodas are pretty freaking hard to find & expencive to ship: Pineapple Fanta, Chocolate Cola, Calpico, & Cactus Cooler. I'd be elated to see those in a game's vending machine.

 

[Kyrian007]

I had to put down "no." I almost said "it depends." It can be too out-of-place or overt, but then I thought about it and realized something.

I don't even notice it. I tune out advertising so much, and so automatically, that I have to see other people complain about ads before I even notice it was there in the first place. I actually have real trouble identifying which tag line belongs with wich brand, and which mascot or spokesperson is associated with which product. I have very few brand loyalties (I'm a bit of a Nintendo apologist, but that has nothing to do with advertising and more to do with actual quality.) So I really can't complain about something that I guess I have really effectively trained myself at some point to completely ignore.