Product Placement

Right, because we wouldn't want the original concept of RPGs to pollute the enjoyment of phat lewtz, or whatever the vernacular is these days. God forbid role players enjoy their favorite genre in a gaming era that doesn't give a shit about them.

So do I Ardy old boy, so do I.

Apparently there are quite a few people who are strangers to the expression "tongue in cheek". Seriously, "The Bill Gates of Kryta". How could anypone take that seriously (although I do kind of like the Coke vs Pepsi PvP). I thought the billboards ridiculous until I saw the one posted here (and I do like the Coke shield - well done guys).

I had become fairly sick of every thread becoming a "we want more free stuff / just be happy with what you're given for a free to play game" argument. Either that or Care bears / PVP, or the ever popular "this is too hard / easy - overpowered / ignored".

I have not stated what my preference was, nor have I stated that Anet are so strapped for cash that they are desperate for more money. Foolishly I put a topic forward for discussion. What was I thinking? Discussions in a Forum, unheard of.

So read the original post again. I'm not suggesting Anet begin implementing product placement. I'm asking what your reaction would be if they did. What level of advertising would you find acceptable? None? Obvious and dominant? There is no right answer here. What I do request is that you not only provide your opinion but back it up, give your reasons.

It's very easy to say: It would ruin the game, /notsigned. I'm not sure what you aren't signing, but you've made your stance known. Now explain why. The coke shield is an excellent example. Or, putting Red Bull advertising in the please take a break message. Both hilarious and they demonstrate the point quite well (that is unless I've misread the tone and they would actually like to see this). Interestingly, some people wouldn't mind these, others would hate it. The interesting thing for me is WHY you would love or hate it. If you can't back up your opinion, then there isn't much point expressing it. It's just verbal masturbation.

lol, is funny because he call me dick for saying bad things about other people, but he say bad things about other people! do you make jokes for a living? you're very good at it.

I don't understand the shitbrickery and "OMG TROLL" myself. As you said you weren't advocating anything but just posing a question.

Anyway I think that if if they tastefully put in advertisements it would be just fine even a little bit nice. I'm sure many of us enjoy the various references to things in the modern universe that exist in guild wars now ("Sleep Now in The Fire", "For Great Justice" ect...). When you see it you're like "hey I recognize that!" You'd get that same feeling just from products rather than cultural references. And anet doesn't necessarily have to pick big conglomerate companies either. They could throw in some type of reference to a trendy clothing store (Obey mayhaps?) or a new indie game that's just come out.

As long as they aren't heavy handed with their product placement (Let's go to Pepsi gully and slay the tide dragon!) and it isn't too excessive (we don't need brand names on everything obviously) I'm sure it'd be a fun for us and profitable for them. Everyone wins. And if the revenue makes it possible for them to roll out more updates more often that's another perk for us.

I don't see how that would betray their "integrity" any more than anything else anet throws in the game. Also as far as immersion goes...if you are so immersed in the game that you forget that there is a real world with pepsi, coke, and munnies you might need a little dose of reality.

I think this is a really interesting idea that is worth thinking about. Just auto dismissing it because "omg da man is try to geht moar munniez frum us!" is a little narrow minded if you ask me.

I wouldn't like it. I am not a strict RPG player, but I pretty much play only sword & sorcery games. Modern product ads would ruin that atmosphere for me. Now if ArenaNet comes out with a new game with a more modern setting then it wouldn't bother me to see ads for current products.

The realization that any non-pen/paper rpg is nothing a thin veneer of fantasy over loot farming and minmax'n for the win is like a kick to the crotch with lead clown shoes...

All though wotc's new "d&d" might make that all rpg's...

Nobody gives a shit about them because they operate in a way that segregates themselves off from the rest of the community.

Honestly it works in a present day setting but not in any kind of medieval fantasy. If this were a modern set game about mafia battles or some such jazz I'd say bring it on. Not every work of fiction needs to take place in a parallel dimension devoid of any existing brand names...

Oh, the times, they are a changin'.

That is correct, none.

If I pay for a product I don't want to see ads - and I don't need to provide arguments. Period.

Free2Play MMO's make their income entirely from associated webstores. There are some aspects of these - such as consumables sold only for real world money - that I wouldn't want to see in GW, but I can imagine that, for instance, fashion, clothes or other visible trinkets could add a usefull source of income.

AION wings were an ad for AION and people actively sought them. An ad doesn't need to be a banner across your screen. It doesn't matter that AION and GW are owned by the same company. This was a cross promotion and people bought into it. Anet just found a very clever way of doing it.

Anet and Coke could do a cross promototion. GW images appear on Coke bottles with ingame content codes on the inside lid of the bottle. You enter this code as you do with any key in GW. Then whenever you want to access an account wide special item (like the imp, or various weapons) you type /Coke to reclaim the item.

The item you are claiming could be consistent with the game. It wouldn't need to be a coke branded item. Coke have already got what they want out of it by your buying their drink. You are constantly reminded of their product everytime you type /Coke to reclaim the special item.

The item you are claiming is paid for by Coke. The game looks the same but with a few new weapons or minis (or whatever). Players get more free content. Resources are saved due to the cross-promotion.

So I would say that you should make a case for why you would want no ingame advertisements when GW already has it and you didn't seem to notice.

Again, you don't have to like it. I'd be surprised if everyone thought the same about this. But providing your opinion without providing the basis for your opinion is a wasted entry.

Then teh internets are not for ju?

Shoot, I'll be disappointed if GW2 DOESN'T have a Mountain Dew quest line that unlocks Signet of Toxic Shock.

More selling out please!

^ This.

Having given the question some more thought, I think in-company adverts are fine, so long as they aren't in the game itself. Take Steam for example: it has oodles of advertisements for its own stuff, but once you get into HL2: DM, you don't see Left 4 Dead posters and BUY OUR STUFF billboards.

Yeah not happening.

Lol Anet with integrity. Made my day.

No, what a lousy idea. It's bad enough our culture finds a way to put product placement into every television show and movie. Don't **** with my games too. I'd rather pay a subscription then see this crap in game.

Its not really the same. The /aion emote requires a player to actively choose to use it. Putting billboards and crap like it in game leaves the player no choice in the matter. Also if anything it was NCSoft promoting GuildWars to Aion players not the other way around. Technically speaking anyone who has the wings SHOULD have a copy of Aion already, as selling the product key is against EULA (though I understand it happens anyways). Even the leaflet reads, "Guild Wars Your Wings Await!" Which mentions nothing of Aion.

I pay money for games to avoid the all the ads and malware associated with free games. If ads are your thing, there are plenty of free browser based games out there for you to play.

However, this point would extent to your example of typing /coke to get a reward. I don't care about any promotional things, those are fine. As long as I'm not seeing ads in-game, on the login screen, or during the update process I'm fine with whatever else they do to get money.

The sad thing is it is inevitable. People hate ads period yet at some point it became socially acceptable to cram 5+ commercials at the beginning of a movie on top of ever rising ticket prices so what's to say the same wont happen to pay for games as well?

Oh and lets not forget cable tv with commercials. That still makes me wtf? to this day...

When it comes to this, they do.

fail attempt at humor is humorous in its own right. kudos to you OP.

The whole idea of immersion is so you can forget (at least for a while) that there is "coke, pepsi and munnies"...

If I wanted to deal with that stuff Id just unplug and live reality. I hear it has infinite resolution and super realistic physics now...

Yeah, but the respawn times are terrible...

LOL!!!

But agree with others, I'm not fond of marketing adds in a game (unless it's like racing games with billboards - those they do fit in - oh and I'm not fond of most racing games lol).

Halo/CoD/Starcraft do NOT have developer (in this case, ANET) sustained servers for the kiddies to play on. Good servers, with good connections, with constant maintenance and upkeep, for an international game with millions of players with varying hardware and connections of their own. Hardware and software updates, security, AS WELL AS SERVER HOUSING. These are HUGE costs, costs that remain constant despite a dip in income after the initial release of the video game.

WoW counters this overhead cost via monthly subscriptions. ANET does not use this business model. Thus, the simply interesting and quizzical question of the topic is, how will they?

ANET is for the most part well-liked by the community. We have close ties to the developers, and they in turn make an extraordinary effort to keep us happy. If we want to toss around ideas, opinions, or feedback that may help out the devs that have treated us so well, what is it to you?

God no. Please. No.

Every where you turn these days you're continually bombarded with advertising trying to get you to spend your money on yet another piece of junk.

I can't even go to the petrol station anymore without some of them having TV advertising and police lectures displayed on pump-mounted TV screens that are activated by the car pulling up to the pump - and you can't turn them off. I've never received a speeding fine or driving fine of any sort in 15 years of driving...but I still get lectured for a couple of minutes about "speed kills" and that I "have to slow down" by a TV when I pull up to fill the car?

Every web page, every TV show, every movie, every bus stop, every bus/tram that passes, every shop window, every newspaper/magazine, every radio station, every blank bit of wall around town, half the cars around town...have advertising plastered all over them trying to con me into buying their product. Every new DVD now forces you to watch not only a lecture on how you shouldn't steal the movie (hello...I just BOUGHT this thing - why am I being lectured again?), but now adds 3-5 movie previews that you cannot skip past. Again...I bought the DVD for the movie on it...why should I have to wait 5-10 minutes watching advertising crap before I'm permitted to watch the movie I paid for? And then have to rewatch the SAME advertising crap every time I want to rewatch the movie?

I'm sick of it. Absolutely fed up with it. Why should we have this nonsense shoved down our throat all the time?

In a world like GuildWars, it's utterly out-of-place and unnecessary. "Hey, I've paid to spend time in a fantasy world, but it'll contain advertising for stuff that does not exist in this world and is completely irrelevant to this world".

No thanks.

Something like the Aion wings...it's an emote that the character can do similar to rank/zrank, it's not shouting out names and interfering with immersion...ok. It doesn't FORCE Aion down your throat...just shows a black pair of wings. It's not out of place in the fantasy world (particularly if you're in Moa form or something already).

Something like the Coke shield, or "take a break and drink a Red Bull"...no. Take your advertising, and shove it. It's inappropriate, it breaks immersion in the GW fantasy world, and has no place in that form there.

If some of the alcohols were named with a nod to products...I could cope. But not billboards, not explicit pull-you-out-of-immersion crap. We get more than enough of it everywhere else.

I would agree that most of the examples that you used would be unacceptable but if they could could tactfully and sneakily sneak references to things in their game and made a decent profit (which they used to fund more constant updates) because of it I think that would be a good thing.

I'll make my answer short and simple.

NO!

So I guess you put no thought in the idea then? Seeing as you have no explanation as to why you think what you think and all.

First of all, I want to know what company is dumb enough to pay serious money to advertise in a game that is five years old, the developers have formally announced it will have no new expansion packs (i.e., major content), and the sequel is scheduled for release in a year or two.

Let me put it this way. The average gamer/consumer cares nothing about Guild Wars. World of Warcraft's beta for their next expansion pack is front page gaming news. The War in Kryta barely even makes a mention.

Second, I'm sure ArenaNet will look at this topic and decide that random strangers on the Internet are obviously financial and marketing experts. So unless you have the patent for some groundbreaking game design, and you're going to give it away to ANet for free, then they aren't going to come to you for business advice.

Finally, if ArenaNet wanted to make money, they can do it without resorting to crap like in-game ads and other ways to annoy their clientele. As if the best way to save a dying game would be to annoy all of the fans with crap advertisement. There's already criticism by both industry professionals and regular gamers that companies are selling out too much and putting in too much crap product placement in games. And now you're asking for more of it.

If ANet really wants to roll in money, then they should sell fancy, animated weapon skins that are only available in the stores and they automatically customize on purchase so they can't be traded. Make fancy NPC armor, like the White Mantle Justicar armor, and sell it directly in the stores for player characters. Sell unique miniatures that also customize on purchase and can't be traded.

Yeah they do. All three of them do. SCII is completely running on private servers, even the progress in the single player campaign is being stored in the games' servers, and not locally. You have to connect to Blizzard's servers to play.

Traditional Multiplayer games are adding more and more features all the time. The distinction between them and an MMO are getting less all the time.

Furthermore, the ACTUAL costs of running a server are very small compared to the costs of developing a game. MMO fans grossly exaggerate the costs of maintaining servers. I think people who crunch the numbers have shown that something like only 5% of the money made from any given MMO goes towards covering server costs. GW specifically has shown that you don't need to nickel and dime people to death in order to have money to maintain an online world.

So I ask again, why the hell are MMO fans wannabe accounts all the time, but not other gamers? Is it just misinformation? Fear that their game will get the plug pulled from them? Halo 2 fans were not going around saying "the Halo series is in financial trouble" when their game lost support on X-Box Live a couple of months ago. They just had to admit "yeah the game's getting old and will no longer be supported." It's not like Halo 2 fans were saying "the reason halo 2 stopped was because Halo 2 didn't make enough money." They admitted reality. Stuff can't last forever. Why can't MMO fans?

As the world's strongest millionaire scientist, I have studied ArenaNet's past 13 quarterly fiscal tax dividend profit-deficit margin reports and have come to the conclusion that it is in ArenaNet's best interest to replace the models of all weapons in Guild Wars with virtual Coca-Cola, Marlboro, and Halliburton products.

/signed for sure. I trust the word of the world's strongest millionaire scientist.

Cigarette guns!

If you would stop playing a game because it has adds then you are obviously playing it for the wrong reasons.

My staff? I wouldn't have anything but a genuine Microsoft staff!

Welcome to Outpost StarCraft 2! Mind the zerglings!

And you find "delightsome foods" that drop like Hot Pockets! Or coupons for your favorite pizza!

Well, it has a certain "zing" to it. I think Blizzard threatened to do something like open their own chain of pizza delivery, but it was an April Fool's joke.

Why are people asking for something annoying when there is no need for it? You already have a no monthly fees game without ads.

Don't ask for them.