Following in the footsteps ofElectronic Arts, Microsoft really want to add a new feature in his xbox games, to the greatest detriment of the players who did not ask for anything. While she is barely introduced, it already cringes all users of the XBox console fleet. Will Microsoft make the same mistakes as EA again? Explanation.
Xbox: not so free games
The biggest mode of the current video game is certainly the Free-To-Play model. This is a style of development where the game is available for free to the consumer, but has several types of micro-transactions or revenue-earning devices internally. This can go through the Ingame purchase of cosmetic products as offered League of Legends and Fortniteor boost to progress faster in the game, as has become fashionable for Ubisoft or Electronic Arts games. This economic model is very controversial but also very popular, since it is very efficient, even if still relatively little present on the console market.. And with it comes another scourge of video games: advertising.
If you’ve ever played a mobile game, you’re a fan of this system: you watch an advertisement, and you get a bonus. Well, Microsoft would be interested in pushing the concept even further, by including advertising placements inside its XBox Free-to-play games. The company is currently working with adtech companies that have already worked with other names like EA or Hi-Rez to create a system to display real advertising posters inside XBox games. The discussions have already started several years ago, and until now the advertising was almost always extra-diegetic, that is to say that it did not exist in the narrative of the game. But unlikeElectronic Arts which has already tried the experiment several timesMicrosoft announces that paid games will not be affected by this internal advertising system.
EA: the king of in-game advertising
This is not the first time that a company has tried to install advertising in a game, and Electronic Arts is the king. A development is expensive, and all means are good to make it profitable. Since 2003 already some games offered billboards visible in the game, such as counter strike Where Battlefield 2142. The controversy has returned to the forefront with titles like Smite, NBA 2K Where UFC 4 in 2020, offering a close-up of a very short ad for the series The Boysand EA did it again with Battlefield 2042 in December 2021, when the game was still riddled with bugs. However, after the UFC 4 controversy, EA announced that it no longer wanted to re-implement advertisements in this style. A promise that did not last long.
But is it really a problem? Each of these occurrences caused a powerful grunt from the side of the players, since they have no choice but to escape this advertising broadcast directly in the game and which is totally out of the immersion that it offers, especially when the advertising has no connection with the game in question. However, the question does not arise when it comes to sponsors of a football gameas Fifa which is going to have to change its name precisely because of a similar problem or car simulation games, such as the recent Gran Turismo 7. On the contrary, these titles want to be closer to reality and these undisguised ads help with that. Finally, we could also talk about product placements or indie games. When Hideo Kojima showed us Norman Reedus drinking Monster cans close-up in death strandingmany applauded the genius of the creator. 2K Games even made fun of it in a DLC of Borderlands 3, where expensive spams appeared in front of the player brutally. If by reflex you broke it with a melee attack, you pay, and it was expensive…
