In-Game-Advertising – advertising in games

Advertising in computer games has been there nearly as long as there are computer games. The first advertisements in computer games were simple banners. Later this evolved into the integration of logos of the developing company as well as brand logos of other businesses. In the beginning in game advertising was pretty much restricted to sports games but later also spread across the other genres.

Meanwhile even movies merge with games more and more – a situation that is used by the advertising industry to market products in new ways. It got a lot harder to reach young people with the traditional media in particular. So to expand the range of advertising messages and to speak to a young target demographic the area of advertising in computer games is probably going to grow even more in the future.

The Ad Game – a form of in game advertising

The Ad Game, which is often also simply called advertising game, is a form of in game advertising. The platform for Ad Games is the medium internet. In an Advergame the advertising message is often only placed in the game environment and not within the game itself. So the advertised product or brand is mainly shown during the intro, extro or within the games name. The goal of such a small advertising game is to heighten awareness for the advertised product or brand. Because of the short nature of the game an Ad Game is played often accordingly. And the more the Advergame is played the more the user memorizes the brand.

The static and dynamic in game advertising

In case of static in game advertising the advertising message is integrated directly into the plot of the game. So there is an obvious product placement within the gameplay itself. Such a product placement could be a poster within the virtual surroundings or a brand product which is consumed by the protagonist of the game. A possible disadvantage of the static in game advertising is that advertising spaces can not be changed to add new advertising messages. This downside stems from the fact that most computer games are games you have to buy. Once placed within a game the advertisement stays fixed at that exact location.

However in online computer games dynamic in game advertising is used. Just like with an Ad Game the platform for this kind of game is the medium internet. But in contrast to an Advergame the “normal” online computer game places the advertising message directly into the gameplay – just like in a console game. The advantage of this kind of in game advertising is that the content of advertisement spaces within the game can be changed at any time. So the advertising message is not unchangeably fixed like in a console game but can be replaced if needed.