“Prose is an art form, movies and acting in general are art forms, so is music, painting, graphics, sculpture, and so on. Some might even consider classic games like chess to be an art form. Video games use elements of all of these to create something new. Why wouldn’t video games be an art form?”
SAM LAKE, WRITER OF THE MAX PAYNE SERIES, 2004
Commercialism is as prevalent in video games as it is in most entertainment media. Advergames, like television’s infomercials or newspaper and magazines’ advertorials, are video games created for purely promotional purposes. The first notable advergame debuted in 1992, when Chester Cheetah, the official mascot for Cheetos snacks, starred in two video games for the Sega Genesis and Super Nintendo systems—Chester Cheetah: Too Cool to Fool and Chester Cheetah: Wild Wild Quest. In late 2006, Burger King sold three advergame titles for Xbox and Xbox 360 consoles for $3.99 each with value-meal purchases. One title, Sneak King, required the player to have the Burger King mascot deliver food to other characters before they faint from hunger. More recent is the innovative interactive Web commercial, “Magnum Pleasure Hunt,” for gourmet Magnum chocolate ice cream bars. In this platform game, the user manipulates the constantly jogging, barefoot “Magnum Girl” up and over the game’s Internet-based environments (such as Bing travel pages, YouTube videos, and luxury hotel Web sites). A player earns points by strategically timing her jumps so that she connects with—or consumes—the game’s many chocolate bon bons, and the Magnum’s specialty chocolate bar is the final reward for Magnum Girl’s (and the player’s) hard work. In-game advertisements are more subtle; they are integrated as billboards, logos, or storefronts in the game (e.g., a Farmers Insurance airship floating by in FarmVille or Dove soap spas appearing in The Sims Social ), or make the product a component of the game (e.g., in the game Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory, a large glowing billboard for AXE deodorant becomes an obstacle for the player to overcome).18
“Video games can never be art.”
ROGER EBERT, FILM CRITIC, 2010
Some in-game advertisements are static, which means the ads are permanently placed in the game. Other in-game ads are dynamic, which means the game ads are digitally networked and can be altered remotely, so agencies can tailor them according to release time, geographical location, or user preferences. A movie ad, for example, can have multiple configurations to reflect the movie’s release date and screening markets. Advertisers can also record data on users who come in contact with a dynamic ad, such as how long they look at it, from what angle, and how often, and can thus determine how to alter their ad campaigns in the future. The Xbox Kinect has taken dynamic advertising one step further with its newest consoles, enabling players to engage with the in-game ads using motion and voice control to learn more about a product.
“Of course they are [art]. It’s just another medium. It’s just interactive.”
AMY HENNIG, CREATIVE DIRECTOR FOR UNCHARTED 2: AMONG THIEVES, 2012
Google’s game advertising strategy, launched in 2008, is to place increasing numbers of ads in well-known social game titles like Frogger and Dance Dance Revolution—an indication of the tremendous potential growth in social gaming. Social game advertising is expected to increase 80 percent by 2014, and all in-game advertising is projected to reach $1 billion in global revenue by that same year.19