UPDATE: The ads have been REMOVED! In recent news, Sony has pulled the ads from the game, so this video is obsolete. While it's always possible that this could be temporary, this is a huge victor...
UPDATE: The ads have been REMOVED! In recent news, Sony has pulled the ads from the game, so this video is obsolete. While it's always possible that this could be temporary, this is a huge victory for us as paying consumers. This is a new type of intrusive advertising being introduced into games, and it needs to be nipped in the bud before it becomes the norm.
For the moment, no more ads. The gaming community has spoken, and they listened.
UPDATE 2: For those who doubt this video or want to see the impact on other events, I've made a new video. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ex8HTY... ========================================
Here's a capture of a loading screen advertisement recently introduced to WipEout HD. I replayed the same track a few times, and captured the loading screen each time. I decided to put the ad screen and normal loading screen next to each other so you can see the extra time added to the loading screen because of the ad. The audio is from the top screen. I don't know if this ad was added because of the Fury expansion or the latest patch, but it's a load of crap. I BOUGHT this game, as well as the expansion, and it has been ad free since I got it a year ago. This kind of shit shouldn't be crammed in after the fact.
If it was just a stationary ad I wouldn't mind. If they advertised on the vehicles or the ad monitors in the game, I wouldn't care too much. But this ad is a video, and it's a little longer than a typical load time. My problem is that I can't skip past the end of the ad even though the level is finished loading. The ad appears every so often (I typically get it 3 times in an hour), and it's only a little longer than the level load time, but that adds up if you play a lot. And since they managed to sneak this in, what's to stop them from forcing you to watch a full 30 second ad or longer before you can play?
If you want advertising in the game, fine. There are plenty of ways to do it. But when your advertising impacts the game's performance, which in this case is the load time, that's complete bullshit. Oh, I should also mention that when I captured this, I had my network cable unplugged, so this ad has been embedded into my game, and I'm forced to watch it even when I'm playing single player, OFFLINE. Forcing me to watch it while I'm playing online is one thing, but altering my single player offline experience is an extremely underhanded tactic.
If this is how SCEA is going to start handling their downloadable games, then I'm going to start waiting several months before buying, and won't be buying any of the games that get ads loaded in them AFTER the game has already been released. This is complete bullshit.
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This could also backfire on you. Sony and other companies may turn around and say "Well since you guys don't like in game ads we need to make up that money somewhere else, so we're going to raise game prices another ten bucks".
Good job video creator for helping to stop Sony from going ahead with this ad bullshit. Sony, I won't be buying your new PS3 slim if I know I have to sit through ads on it.
The thing is, i don't really mind ads in games. I never really saw the big deal. If ads mean the makers of wipeout bring more cash in to fund future projects, thats great. Although the extra 10 seconds is a bit much.
Maybe a video stream of the ad on a billboard inside the game would be more reasonable. And it would add more realism of the game.
I guess as someone who deals with ads all the time watching tv ep reruns online, this doesn't surprise me in the least, or seem like such a big deal..that, and I remember some hefty load times from PS2 games (and that was JUST the game). if I can suck it up and deal with 30 seconds to a minute of a KY ad online, I can deal with a few extra seconds in my game loads. its extra time to run for a drink anyway, right?
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Maybe a video stream of the ad on a billboard inside the game would be more reasonable. And it would add more realism of the game.
glad they took the loading screen ad out though
I dont really mind ads ......But when it effects the actuall performance of the games themselves (as this video proves) its simply not on.....
So pleased people power won at the end of the day.....
As gamers we should all stand up against this sort of thing......
We shouldnt except this sort of thing.......
By all means use ads (on billbords,sponsers etc) .........But dont break the games in the process....
if I can suck it up and deal with 30 seconds to a minute of a KY ad online, I can deal with a few extra seconds in my game loads.
its extra time to run for a drink anyway, right?