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EA signs with two in-game ad firms

Publisher will sell space in upcoming games; Need for Speed Carbon and Battlefield 2142 to be company's first games featuring dynamic ads.

In-game advertising firms have been signing publishers to their services for years, but there has always been one notable holdout: the world's largest third-party publisher, Electronic Arts. Today EA announced its initial steps into the world of dynamically served in-game ads, and those steps will come with the help of two competing ad services, IGA Worldwide and Microsoft-owned Massive Inc.

For IGA World Wide, EA has committed to deliver a portfolio of no fewer than three games across "select EA franchises" that incorporate the company's in-game ad technology. The first game announced as part of the deal is the PC first-person shooter Battlefield 2142, which is set for release later this year.

On the Massive side, EA will tap the firm to provide dynamic in-game advertising for up to four of its titles on PC and Xbox 360, starting with Need for Speed Carbon. Previous installments of the game have featured static advertising (where the game ships with the ad placed in a part of the game and never changes), but this will be the first time the publisher can switch out and update ads on the fly to help promote more time-sensitive products or campaigns.

Dynamically served ads can come in all sizes and formats, from billboards and movie clips to radio jingles and in-game objects. Financial terms were not disclosed for either agreement, nor were any potential advertisers identified.

184 Comments

  • Sociologist

    Posted Nov 6, 2006 12:30 am GMT

    Screw EA! I won't spend another penny on any of their products, and just sold my copy of BF2142 on Ebay, (so that EA won't get a cut, lol). Fight the power.

  • MichaelSullivan

    Posted Oct 27, 2006 10:29 am GMT

    EA GAMES, INCORPORATED - I'd just like to say that you have a let down. A big advertising campaign on in your games while playing? This is something out of a horror film! Not only do we pay you for the game, you enslave us with adware whilst playing games? Big let down I say, I shall not support you any more by paying for your ad-infested games.

  • aloysius256

    Posted Oct 25, 2006 3:52 pm GMT

    ABSOLUTELY ABHORRENT STRATEGY. This has ruined my game experience. I vowed to give EA one more chance to prove themselves after the initial folly of BFMEII. This ensures I will no longer purchase ANY EA games. Ever.

  • darkpresence

    Posted Oct 23, 2006 10:53 pm GMT

    stan, i think alot of people would agree realistic advertising is permissible if the "ad" is a part of the static environment e.g. coke or pepsi vending machine model, a restuarant like Ihop, or mcdonalds etc in an urban environement, or a BIllboard while racing in Nascar. as long as its part of the in game environement, a rendered in game model with texturemap and is static. i wouldnt mind, your correct, it would be a bit more realistic. But i wouldnt have to worry about the game being overly intrusive by relaying information abut me looking at the game or clicking it to see a can comes out. 2 things this promotes, 1, security flaws!, 2 it reduces the performance of the computer by tying up the cpu and memory and internet even for a brieft second or 2, its taking and siphoning my performance int he game. its not even an option to have dynamic, changeable intrusive objects in my game and on top of that relayng information on my viewing habits. who the hell they thinkt hey are? its none of their business what i look at! to me its intrusion of my privacy at its very core! and its not permissible in any form.

  • darkpresence

    Posted Oct 23, 2006 10:47 pm GMT

    what is to keep EA from slaugthtering your pc?? ITs proven that the game BF2142 cant run if u delete the spyware program that runs the data transfer with the IGA. there is obvioulsyt some way to block it from running, and i thank god for those intelligent deviants lol who play with code and find loopholes daily to make my world a better place lol.

    but this is truly tragic lol. its almost comical. I think i speak for alot of people i wont buy anything from EA. as far as im concerend im focusing my money into more "deserving" companies.

  • darkpresence

    Posted Oct 23, 2006 10:40 pm GMT

    few people sam03is?? have u taken a look on the net? the firestorm this has ccreated? I think its more than a few people. I also think a people in general wouldnt mind IGA (in game ads) if the savings were passed onto the customer in the formof reduced price tag, enhanced content, make those booster packs free.
    I think EA has truly dropped the ball. and these "few" people numbers in the thousands if not 10's of thousands. so i think its more than a few people sam03is. your correct from a businessstandpoint its beneficial to them, but they are getting bribed! and those "millions" of dollars in ad revenue isnt gonna look likemuch when u add up the number of $50 x10-20,000 customers not buying your game due to the blatant slap in the face use of spyware and ADS in the game. getting screwed without getting a reach around. its stupid, and EA is gonna suffer for it.

    i for one will be responding with my wallet. like the thousands out there.

    and bend over and take it? please wake up and smell the real world. america or whatever country we as customers have rights, and therefore we have the "freedom" to speak with out minds and our wallets. EA exists because of us! and they will only continue because of us. its not us who will change, it will be EA who will change or will have truly hard times over the next year or so until they realize they cant do things like this.

  • RPG_Ash

    Posted Oct 23, 2006 10:04 am GMT


    Man this sucks big time.

    There are also other people who think the same on:

    Broadband Reports.com Security Forum

    "Battlefield 2142 ships with spyware? Say it ain't so"

  • sam03is_

    Posted Oct 21, 2006 7:01 am GMT

    PHH who am i kidding....... WE F***ING ROCK!!!!!! SUCK IT CANADA!!!! ;P

  • sam03is_

    Posted Oct 21, 2006 6:53 am GMT

    im not so much saying "bend over and take it" as much as im saying "why have a sook about something that has already happened and is more than likely going to keep happening?" After all, its not all that likely that EA is going to give up a contract worth millions just because a few people are crying about it.
    You have a good point though. i would much preffere to have a major company like EA with "spyware" (for lack of a better word) in my computer than some retard with the sole purpose of slaughtering my PC.

    B.T.W. Not Canadian, Australian......... im personaly not sure which is worse......

  • Viper24235

    Posted Oct 19, 2006 6:19 pm GMT

    .
    .

    >Now EA have stated that they do not give out ANY personal or private >information about the person playing there games. To me, this means that >changing this rule would put EA and the other firms in jeopardy of there >contract and would be sued for millions buy all teh pissed off gamers around >who feel they have been violated.

    >The sooner we accept the future for what it is going to be, the easier it will be >on all of us.

    Yeah that's it, becuase EA can misplace private data just as easily as anyone else. Just becuase you never see vampires and have an anti vampire rock doesn't mean it's doing anything. As far as that last sentence, that sounds like something you really need to think hard on. Bend over and take it? You must be Canadian.

  • rta

    Posted Oct 19, 2006 7:06 am GMT

    Would we expect any less out of EA? Seriously? Don't push ads to my box in a game I paid good money for....

    Up theirs.

  • sam03is_

    Posted Oct 18, 2006 9:30 pm GMT

    The fact of the matter is that there has been advertising in games since the days of the PS one and even the Super Nintendo. The only difference between EA signing with these firms is that instead of constantly looking at the same old adds day after day, you see what new products are out there. And hell, if you don't like the idea of it all then don't play the game or buy the products advertised in it. Send some nasty letters to EA saying how they aren't very nice because they made you cry.
    Personally, all i see EA doing is making us all very aware of the future of gaming cause believe me, they wont be the only ones to do it.
    Now EA have stated that they do not give out ANY personal or private information about the person playing there games. To me, this means that changing this rule would put EA and the other firms in jeopardy of there contract and would be sued for millions buy all teh pissed off gamers around who feel they have been violated.
    The sooner we accept the future for what it is going to be, the easier it will be on all of us.

  • Stan920

    Posted Oct 17, 2006 2:21 am GMT

    Here something, the people that rent the servers and own the servers are getting screwed if this is true. They get nothing for serving up the ads or hosting the ads. It not like EA owns all the servers. At any rate, if ads are surfed up, just dont buy there products, and write the advertisers that you wont buy there products. Thats the only tool we have and we must all stick togeather for this to work.

  • nikeballerz

    Posted Oct 12, 2006 6:21 pm GMT

    Ads sometimes makes games more realistic, like sports game etc. i wouldnt mind ads in NFS:C if its occasional. But in battlefield, i hope its not gonna be too far-fetched, like placing an ad just so there is an ad there....

  • onlineterrorism

    Posted Sep 29, 2006 7:27 am GMT

    This is a stupid idea. If they are going to add Dynamic Ads, they need to lower the price range to purchase this game.

  • amd_fan

    Posted Sep 23, 2006 9:07 am GMT

    If it's unintrusive then I wouldn't mind but If I hear a Pepsi Jingle advertised during the loading screen or if it goes out of it's way to download a video while I'm trying to play leaving me waitng then it is one title that will promptly be returned for a refund. It looks like this is a title that my Firewall will have to block from accessing the internet, I have no time to download videos that I don't want.

  • masterlu

    Posted Sep 23, 2006 2:29 am GMT

    Right...this looks like fun. TBH, I don't think dynamic billboard ads in NFS:C would bother me that much, but I'll wait for the reviews... If gamespot tells me the ads are intrusive and bothersome then I'll just do the decent thing and support my local pirate instead of EA, which is probably something EA is expecting us to do.

    Make no mistake, EA is not stupid; I'm guessing they have a large number of very qualified and educated people constantly trying to figure out the effect something like this will have on sales and calculate which is better for cashflow, ads and plenty of negative publicity or no ads and just the regular amount of bad press.

    As for BF 2142 - I haven't finished playing BF2 yet, so I'll probably not be getting it anyway, looking forward to ET:QW.

  • Metr01973

    Posted Sep 17, 2006 8:08 am GMT

    It doesn't really bother me that much but for gamers who don't like it, are there going to be pop-up blockers like we have in our browsers? Will there be some third party "hacker" who invents one so the ppl who don't want to see ads can have them blocked. But if this does happen, will it then make online play impossible, will punk buster have to program it in to the next update? Like I said before, it doesn't really bother me that much but for games that are suposed to be set 100 years in the future I don't want to see an advert for the latest mobile phone in 2006, it just won't work. An advert in a game such as GRAW for example where it's based just slightly in the future and on the "real" world, I think it would be OK. As long as advertisers don't MAKE us watch an advert , shove it down our throats every 2 minutes and as long as they make sure that they keep the adverts relevant to the game that we're playing then I can't see a problem with it. A really blatant piece of advertising in a recent game has to be Splinter Cell Chaos Theory with the Airwaves chewing gum, that was just OTT.

  • nodnarb77

    Posted Sep 11, 2006 11:37 pm GMT

    I'm going to have to agree with many of the other comments here. I was probably a possible customer for buying both NFS:Carbon and/or Battlefield 2142, but without a price cut on the cost of the games there is no good reason for us, the gamers, to have these "dynamic advertisements". It might be time for big name publishers like EA to take note of what gamers want for a change. After all, gamers are truly the ones who control this market!

    I will not buy either of these games solely because of this included advertising. I'm sure they will be great, and I have owned every game in the Battlefield series, but not greater than games for gamers, like Guild Wars and Enemy Territory: Quake Wars. (Which will be a great alternative for my battlefield "style" game addiction.)

    I'm sure there is a way for in-game advertising to work, but if we gamers are still paying full retail with these ads included it is a waste of our hard earned money and bandwidth.

  • PAthena_basic

    Posted Sep 10, 2006 6:19 am GMT

    I have yet to see the price of movies or concession items decrease because of advertising at the movies, and I wouldn't hold my breath on that one with games. In fact, I've seen the prices at the theaters RISE. I've just stopped going to the movies as often (except for those that I really want to see on the big screen) whereas, in the past, I may have gone just to do something, to hang out with friends, just to pass the time. The quiet before-movie time, of catching up with friends (yes, actual face to face conversation) is now ruined. Companies will always site rising costs to do all kinds of things, from laying off people when they don't have to, to screwing over the consumer, and somewhere waaaay out of our sight, someone (or a select group of people) are getting obscenely wealthy.

    While ads may not ruin all games, it COULD in certain types of games, or if it slows down the game, adds pop ups (for instance, in certain sporting games, stats might be automatically brought up just so they can show a logo) or takes us out of the gameplay. My friend who is a great fan of certain EA sports games was disgusted at all the "sponsored" events, logos all over load screens and the aforementioned bringing up of stats. I think, in games where you are someplace away from today's reality (fantasy setting, futuristic settings) they should really restrain themselves, and not put advertising, except perhaps at the back of the instruction book (if that). An occasional billboard, or some ad banners at sports settings (which is realistic) isn't too bad, but they are beginning to get more invasive now.

    And the reason that people make a big deal is that it disrespects the customer. It's saying "OK, so you paid $50 or $60 for a game. Doesn't matter. We're going to force you to see something just so we can make money off of it." As long as we allow businesses to disrespect us, I suppose we deserve what we get. I just hope that the many companies that I still respect will stay away from that practice.

  • RahKayne

    Posted Sep 9, 2006 1:58 pm GMT

    oh noes

  • Gater29

    Posted Sep 9, 2006 11:41 am GMT

    People are making too big a deal out of this. We see like a million adverstisements every time we go to the movies, and the majority of them include the drinks people in the movies are drinking or maybe a scene with the tv in the background showing a commercial. No one really pays attention to them. Actually, it will likely make the price of games come down, and doesn't it just make the game worlds seem a little more realistic to have real world ads rather than the made up bogus ads you see in the billboards of games now?

  • a_dirty_hippie

    Posted Sep 9, 2006 9:39 am GMT

    nice way to put it. pilch. lol. thats exactly what i would do and have done.

  • Pilch_R_eD

    Posted Sep 7, 2006 8:29 pm GMT

    I remember the Macdonalds billboard in NSFU. . . . That didint bother me. BUT! If im driving past tonnes of advertisments in NFSC, it could get really distracting. *Hey, its the new Nokia, might want one of them* . . . . . oh hey . . . . Ive crashed into a wall and lost the race . . . . . . . . Hmm, but this wall has a KFC advertisment on it . . . . . Maybe ill just quit the game and go and get some lunch . . . . .

  • HyperMetaDragon

    Posted Sep 6, 2006 3:13 pm GMT

    Sweet.

  • harrypott3r

    Posted Sep 6, 2006 6:55 am GMT

    i think this is a wonderful idea..see a later

  • SmallPower

    Posted Sep 5, 2006 1:36 am GMT

    Brilliant - I literally can not wait to enjoy EA's sponsors' advertisements in Will Wright's "Spore" and in the next LOTR knock-off "The White Council." I demand to see Saruman sit down to enjoy a delicious nutritious bucket of KFC with a Cheetos garnish, to be washed down with regurgitated M&Ms and Sprite, all set to the latest American Idol winner's album (plays great on Intel with Nvidia). Hopefully ads will be present in every stage of the evolution of everyone's creatures in Spore, or else that game will suck and I'll boycott it.

    SONY ONLINE ENTERTAINMENT

    Thanks for reading; I have a thriving in-post advertising business of my own to run. TOYOTA Please contact me privately for rates and availability.

    NIKE

    VIACOM

    BECHTEL

    PIZZA HUT

  • twynsicle

    Posted Sep 4, 2006 9:52 pm GMT

    i spose at least for us pc gamers there will be several fixes to remove/block any adverts within days of the games release

  • Rifle_Grunt

    Posted Sep 4, 2006 2:24 am GMT

    BF2142 is supposed to be set in the future. If I have adds for Sugar Puffs and Cola then it will completely ruin the theme because it is supposed to be an almost apocalyptic world and so there would be no material goods

    ps. Anyone who found BF2 was slow to load, GET MORE RAM I found that maps were taking under 40 seconds to load, down from about 7 mins when i had 512mb.

  • twynsicle

    Posted Sep 4, 2006 1:50 am GMT

    ok sure, the cost of making games has gone up, but so have the number of people buying games, i'm sure many thousands of times more people bought most wanted than need for speed 1 (at many times the price per unit as well), rising development costs are a scam by the developers to make up think what they are doing is alright

  • _Sam_

    Posted Sep 3, 2006 3:03 pm GMT

    I hope this does make games cheaper

  • mooseman721

    Posted Sep 3, 2006 10:16 am GMT

    Why worry, with rising dev costs it might prevent the price of games going up, they have been static for some time now and if it doesnt affect gameplay, who cares?

  • twynsicle

    Posted Sep 3, 2006 4:10 am GMT

    whats next, dynamic commercial breaks in dvds we buy?
    c'mon, if i pay $100+ for a game, that should be enough
    the only way i'd accept this is if there were a sizeable discount and a choice between having ads or not, and i'd still probably take the version without ads

    and won't it completly detract from a futuristic shooter to have ads from the present in it, not to mention the extra load time as i have to download new adverts (at 256k, though don't get me started on nz broadband...)

  • Hitman650

    Posted Sep 2, 2006 6:29 am GMT

    WHAT?! How can EA go this low?! EA should have enough common sense to know that everyone hates ads and that dynamic ads are probably the most depicable form of advertising I have ever seen. You are forced to pay extra money for ads you couldn't care less about and then have them rammed down your throat for no reason other than to try to make a company richer. If you ask me, this is not an effective strategy, as most people just get P.O.'d when they have to sift through tons of unwanted ads to get something.

  • Some_One_Plays

    Posted Sep 2, 2006 1:37 am GMT

    I'm cool with it because it doesn't effect game play in anyway so, do your thing.

  • VegetaMaelstrom

    Posted Sep 1, 2006 6:14 pm GMT

    Prepare to get bent over by EA and have them tell us to like it.

  • f15srcool

    Posted Sep 1, 2006 5:46 pm GMT

    as long as they dont make us listen to britney in game.

  • mp503

    Posted Sep 1, 2006 4:34 pm GMT

    i dont give a crap if they do this but if it effects the price i wont mined chunking a little more for this game

  • cannuck38

    Posted Sep 1, 2006 2:14 pm GMT

    As long as they keep the prices down, I'm not complaining.

  • Mkeegs79

    Posted Sep 1, 2006 1:45 pm GMT

    I doubt EA will lower the price of the game. We can all hope. If they dont then its their greed. They already a cash cow.

    It wont effect gameplay in anyway but they should be doing this for the consumer, not their pockets.

  • PrinceAdam11

    Posted Sep 1, 2006 1:31 pm GMT

    im disgusted by this. if EA spent more time developing NFS: Underground 2 then putting ads in the game it might not have sucked.

  • anamnawshad

    Posted Sep 1, 2006 10:01 am GMT

    I have no problem with ads if they keep the price low.....

  • Spitfire357

    Posted Sep 1, 2006 10:00 am GMT

    if the ads are included in the game.. Do you think EA will lower the price of the game just like TDU?

  • makemeweak

    Posted Sep 1, 2006 8:53 am GMT

    Remember when they used to put fake spoof ads all over the place? Ah - those were the days...

  • nitrog

    Posted Sep 1, 2006 8:51 am GMT

    " bc226
    Dynamically served ads can come in all sizes and formats, from billboards and movie clips to radio jingles and in-game objects. That says it all right there they can add almost any kind of thing they want so your immersion level will be out the window any time you play a game and get a movie trailer its gonna be a bust and if games arent cheaper then its just wrong. "

    ok man look they are not going to shoot themselves in the foot like that think about it if the game gets a crappy review they don't make any money anyway and if the advertisements get to the point where the immersion into the game is destroyed then that exactly what it will get. what they are refering to when they say "dynamic" means that it will change occasionaly for instance on level 2 you see a pepsi billboard in the middle of a broken down highway laying on the ground. A week later if your ps3 is on the internet all the time it may of downloaded a new symbol like axe deodorant spray or something and that would be on the billboard in the middle of the road on level 2. or you turn a tv on in game and it plays a short commercial like it was on the tv in the game then next week turning the same tv on it might play a diffrent commercial. it acctually sound kinda neet when you put it like that because things about the game would be updated from the internet. so the enviroment would change around you ever time you played. the billboard was a rather bad way to do it since if you pass by it once it should be the same every time you pass by it because in real life nobody would take the time to change the advertisement on a billboard that's already laying in the middle of a road.

  • peter_l1993

    Posted Sep 1, 2006 8:49 am GMT

    if they're cheaper maybe but otherwise they can take their dynamic crap and shove it up their A-holes.

  • bc226

    Posted Sep 1, 2006 8:32 am GMT

    Dynamically served ads can come in all sizes and formats, from billboards and movie clips to radio jingles and in-game objects. That says it all right there they can add almost any kind of thing they want so your immersion level will be out the window any time you play a game and get a movie trailer its gonna be a bust and if games arent cheaper then its just wrong.

  • nitrog

    Posted Sep 1, 2006 8:24 am GMT

    OK guys this is not a new topic advertiseing has been in games forever...........there have been games with advertiseing in them since the days of the 64. The only thing that is changeing is that now it's dynamic. I just hope it's not IN YOUR FACE upfront about it like makeing it part of the loading screens or something because that totally kills the gaming expirence. but if they make it part of the enviroments in the game it's perfectly acceptable because they been doing it for years. I don't mind seeing a pepsi billboard in desicrated cities unless it's horribly out of place especially if i can blow a huge freggin hole in it or driving along i don't mind if i have a sponser on the car ahead of me thats a real life company. Also advertisements are a good way to offset the costs of maintaining servers for online play which is what is probably going to keep this game free for online play on the ps3.

  • billyyoda

    Posted Sep 1, 2006 7:08 am GMT

    Being a Signmaker, I agree there is revenue to be made with ads, But please not in the one area I go to get away from it all and sucking up even more bandwidth to display the dynamic advertising. Let's stick to making games with great game-play and leave the ads to tv, radio and websites.

  • falen55

    Posted Sep 1, 2006 6:44 am GMT

    Wait, so you people arent gonna buy either game because of ads in them? Ok idiots, I'll just be enjoying my game while you have a fit about how greedy EA is.

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