Advertising prepares to make its biggest push yet into the video game world.
Need a sword? A couple of gold pieces will fetch you a sturdy one. Hungry? That can be remedied for a silver piece or two. Of course, both the merchandise and the currency are worthless outside of the game.
Changes are on the way to the world of Norrath, though. Starting mid-next week, players will be able to order a real world pizza (with real world pepperoni, even) by simply typing "/pizza" in the game.
It"s an interesting experiment on Sony"s behalf. Can the publisher introduce advertising to its game world in a way that doesn"t seem obtrusive – but still generates a response among some of its 325,000 active players?
Advertisements have slowly been trickling into video games for a couple of years now. That trickle is about to become a torrent, though. And despite all the research, no one"s certain how players will react.
Sony is hardly alone in looking for ways to bring in advertising revenue. UbiSoft will include dynamic ads in the next versions of its popular "Splinter Cell" and "Rainbow Six" games. Atari (Research), Vivendi Universal Games (Research) and Take Two (Research) plan to follow suit, as well.
Even Activision (Research), the industry"s second largest publisher, is getting interested in the field. Last year, the company announced it was working with Nielsen Entertainment Media to develop a technology that would track both how many in-game ads a player encounters and how much attention he or she pays to them.
For Sony, this is the first step in what will likely be a broader transaction system. When players type "/pizza", a new browser window opens, connecting to PizzaHut.com and allowing the player to place a delivery order. There"s no need to log out of the game and leave your fellow players in the lurch as they rush into battle.
"We don"t want to do anything that will take people out of the game experience," said Chris Kramer, director of corporate communications for Sony Online Entertainment. "We don"t want to create armor that has the Nike swoosh or you have to drink Coke for health. Our subscribers would freak out."