Paramount's promo campaign for "War of the Worlds" includes the typical billboards and posters. But auds won't just see them from their cars.
Studio is banking that lots of young men will see them on their PCs while playing Ubisoft's new "Splinter Cell" vidgame, where ads for "Worlds," "Aeon Flux" and "The Longest Yard" have been digitally inserted.
In-game advertising is the newest marketing frontier and Hollywood is jumping onboard.
Massive, one of the pioneers in the space, launches its computer network this week, allowing it to upload fresh ads to online gameplayers. The company expects to reach some 500,000 gamers and is set have ads in 40 titles by year-end.
Massive's technology dynamically places ads on billboards, walls, and even pizza boxes within game environments. Ads, which typically consist of posters but will soon integrate sound, can be updated via the net as Massive's clients dictate.
Company is hoping it can offer two advantages over traditional media:
- Real-time tracking of every viewer who sees an ad.
- A targeted way to reach the overwhelmingly male aud that is abandoning traditional TV to play games.
Other Hollywood clients signing onto Massive include New Line, UPN and G4TechTV.
"It's an interesting way to reach teens and older males by breaking through the clutter," says Par interactive marketing veep
Amy Powell.
It's just a matter of time, it seems, before vidgames become another part of that clutter.
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