What is the biggest game advertising fail you have ever come across?

[Mangod]

Here's another beauty.

Now, if Sony had released that ad in South Africa, THAT would have been a masterpiece.

Im sorry, what!? i refuse to believe this was an official ad, it just cant be....

It was. And yeah, it sucks the root. But it's better in that you could at least argue that it was an attempt at being stylistic backfiring, unlike the Dead Space 2 "We think you still need your moms permission to buy games"-ad.

 

[008Zulu_v1legacy]

Another vote for Daikatana.

I remember Homefront having no small amount of advertising. Then they come out and said that the campaign was 6 hours.

 

[Launcelot111]

I despise those Gamestop ads with the rabbit running through some Mario level and then at the end they're like "this is a game that looks terrible and isn't even a game. Buy at Gamestop!" The animation is so terrible and there is nothing appealing or informational about anything. Or even worse, the Gamestop commercials where there are two game characters standing around during a multiplayer match or something and then painfully unfunny dialogue will be dubbed in as the characters awkwardly shake back and forth. I really have nothing against Gamestop as a company, but the commercials make me ashamed to shop there. They suggest to me that all video game enthusiasts are to be thought of as absolute morons driven by some pavlovian response to video games, no matter how mindless and devoid of quality the depiction of the video game is.

 

[MasochisticAvenger]

Well I would have said EA's Deadspace 2, but that's already got enough attention so I wonder if this counts?


Not strictly an advertisement for a game, but it's still pretty bad.

 

[SH4DOWSL4Y3R]

I'm just waiting for the idiot that decides to actually shit themselves on a bus then tries to sue capcom for it. theres almost always someone that stupid somewhere.

can't really think of anything that hasn't been posted already as far as ad fails go.

i guess maybe if lack of advertising counts then the vita would be a viable contender. seriously, it's less than a month away and it's barely been advertised at all. so many people don't even know what it is when i say i'm getting one.

 

[Launcelot111]

Well I would have said EA's Deadspace 2, but that's already got enough attention so I wonder if this counts?


Not strictly an advertisement for a game, but it's still pretty bad.

Oh dear lord this is terrible. Now we've switched from gamers being braindead idiots who will buy anything to asocial asses who can't prioritize financial needs or have successful relationships without a game store's help. I've come to the conclusion that the games industry in general cares very little for its customer, surprising no one

 

[Andaxay]

Gamestation's advertising is terrible whatever they're promoting. I worked there for a couple of months just before Christmas, and one of my tasks was to remove the "Cheaper than a ho-ho-ho!" promotion for something else. One of the guys I worked with let me know that most people that came in found it more relevant to whores than Christmas. And their box-less stock is put in boxes saying "same game, just naked!" Ohh, the innuendos, that company seriously needs to find a new marketing team.

When I was a lot younger Sony did an advert for either Playstation or PS2 featuring a girl whose features had been messed around with until she looked like an alien. I was only young at the time but I remember thinking "what the HECK does this have to do with Playstation?"

 

[Yopaz]

Well I would have said EA's Deadspace 2, but that's already got enough attention so I wonder if this counts?


Not strictly an advertisement for a game, but it's still pretty bad.

I had forgotten that one. That thing was really terrible.

OT: There's no such thing as terrible advertisement. If you get annoyed or even offended by advertisement you will keep the name of the product in your mind just because it's memorable.

Edit: I just realized that I made a poor use of words. There's no terrible advertisement from the point of the company advertising.

 

[Tourmeta]

It's a console commercial but still. Good god.

 

[Jaythulhu]

Such a terrible advertisement, how can Blizzard possibly believe this will bring them more customers? Terrible humour and a really vague reference.

Who on earth is that? Is she a celebrity of some kind? From where, and what has she done?

At least with the Shatner & Mr T ones they were kinda amusing, and the Chuck Norris one.. well, I know who he is and it is kinda appropriate, given that general chat in the barrens has been nothing but chuck norris "jokes" for over 5 years.

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OT: I have to vote along with the many others who've said Daikatana as the absolute worst, but the ads for MW3 and BF3 were pretty damn awful too.

 

[aaronobst]

not really fitting the criteria here but still funny as fuck

 

[saruman31]

This: http://www.gametrailers.com/video/the-lost-world-gone/724474. No words can describe the fail.

 

[DanielBrown]

This is not a gaming advertisement, but I really want to post it anyways.
A Swedish company named Locum made some Christmas advertising and decided to be cute and switch an "o" for a heart. Look how well that went;

Baffling that no one noticed it before it hit the papers.

 

[Aussie502]

Who on earth is that? Is she a celebrity of some kind? From where, and what has she done?

At least with the Shatner & Mr T ones they were kinda amusing, and the Chuck Norris one.. well, I know who he is and it is kinda appropriate, given that general chat in the barrens has been nothing but chuck norris "jokes" for over 5 years.

I think she was in a scene from Scott Pilgrim vs. the World where she had a similar rant about diamonds or something, I'm not sure as I haven't seen it.

 

[The Night Angel]

Well Mortal Kombat Deception got delayed in France because they hadn't realised that 'deception' in French means 'disappointment'. Though considering how that game turned out, they shouldn't have changed the title....

 

[NinjaDeathSlap]

Here's another beauty.

Now, if Sony had released that ad in South Africa, THAT would have been a masterpiece.

The. FUCK!

Who the hell would make that add and think "Yup, this won't be a problem for anybody."

 

[NinjaDeathSlap]

Well the Ivy chest pic for the upcoming Soul Cal 5 is pretty bad but I'd say the biggest ad fail would be anything to do with Duke Nukem Forever.

Haha, yeah, the soul calibur 5 ads were pretty bad. Though they would become the exact opposite if the voldo one was actually real.

It would go from cheap, sad attempt at the blatant 'sex sells' field of thought, to brilliant, hilarious satire with a tongue-in-cheek element that an advertising campaign like that so desperately needs.

Or sometimes you just get examples that are just so unintentionally goofy that they're hilarious. For example, passing my local Gamestation in town today my eyes were drawn to a big, bold poster advertising the new Resident Evil: Revelations. The gimmick for this game being that it's a Resident Evil game on hand-held consoles, and thus the poster bore this slogan...

'Now you can sh*t yourself on a bus!'

Now, obviously, I see what they're intentions were here, but how the hell did no-one marketing this notice how that slogan could backfire? It's not really offensive and it's not hurting anyone, but the sheer fantastic stupidity of it has earned a special place in my heart. I very nearly collapsed in the middle of the street laughing!

haha. Well in this case i would say that maybe you should think for a moment about that. I'd argue it's the exact opposite of terrible, as it seems to have achieved everything an ad sets out to do.

It's made you think of the game, it's made you remember both the game and the ad, it's made you tell others about the game/ad... and with any luck all that attention has roped a good number of people into actually buying it.
I mean, as far as advertising goes sounds to me like they hit the nail on the head, and then some.

Well, I won't deny it leaves an impression. I just can't believe that someone had a meeting about how to market an adult game and said "Y'know what'd be good? Let's say this game will make them shit themselves in a public place. Because there's nothing adults like the sound of more than shitting themselves in a public place!"

I know they're only kidding, but it's still marvelously retarded.

 

[dimensional]

not really fitting the criteria here but still funny as fuck

Seriously wtf I found it hard to get through that without excessive cringing is that some sort of induction video? because if they played something like that I would seriously reconsider my decision to join even if I did need the money.

OT: I dont see a lot of game promotions now except magazine placements but I do remember the Turok promotion `name your baby Turok and we will pay you 10000$ or something.

The best one I remember though was Shadowman 2 offering to buy advertising space on peoples tombstones to promote the game yeah smooth. (I believe it was later claimed to be an April fools day joke after they got into a bit of trouble over it as [sarcasm/]hilarious[/sarcasm] a joke as it was).