In Game Advertising – Heavy Gamers Actually Like It?
MediaPost just published some stats on gaming. Note, they grouped the respondents into 2 categories. Heavy gamers were those who spent 11+ hours gaming. Anything less was considered Light/Medium gaming (75% of the respondents fell into this category).
Heavy gamers were more likely to accept and embrace in-game advertising than light/medium gamers. 37 percent agreed that featuring actual products or companies in games make the games feel more realistic, while 27 percent of light/ medium gamers agreed. Half of heavy gamers believe that advergaming “is inevitable and will be in all or most games in the future,” compared to 42 percent of light/medium gamers.
I really don’t play 11 hours per week anymore (until the next Elder Scrolls comes out, baby), but I agree that in-game ads seeing real products does make it feel more real. The jury’s still out, regarding my opin, when it comes to interruption ads. Not sure I’m going to like anything like that. I guess if I pay $60 for a game, I feel like I ought to get to play it w/o advertising interruption.
4 Comments
I don’t mind ads in the background, but I would be outraged if they interrupted the game for an ad. Like you said, paying $60 for something and then having to be sold on soemthing is ridiculous!
We’re on the same page. Can you just imagine paying that much and still having interruption ads? Ugh.
Why not let me pay $30 for it and give me interruptions. That I can deal with.
Agreed. If they’re putting ads in the games then the games need to be cheaper. Also, it depends on the ad placement in the game. If it’s like “coke” on a vending machine, then yeah. That works. But if it’s just randomly placed in the game just to be there then I’m not so happy with that, because then you know it’s an advertisement and not an effort to make the game more “realistic”.
I’d say for the most part, if they take a page from ad placement in shows and movies, I’ll be happy.