Links For The Day
I temporarily lost access to my rss reader (read: I'm an idiot) so I had to find news the old way, like our ancestors did a few hundred years ago: I read a bunch of blogs and whatnot.
On this blog we bring together the latest insights in the cross-over of business and gaming - from gamevertising to businessgames.
To find out more about Futurelab: Click here
Authors
Blogs we read
- Avant Game
- Serious Games Source
- Game Research
- Advertising Lab
- Raph’s Website
- Henry Jenkins
- the-inbetween.com
- Joystick101
- GameSetWatch
- Kotaku
- Marketing & Strategy Innovation Blog
- Business Communicators of Second Life
- Destructoid
- Adverblog
- We the Sheeple
- The Daedalus Project
- GamePolitics.com
- Future-Making Serious Games
- Serious Games Portal
- Darren Herman
- Water Cooler Games
- Clickable Culture
- reBang
- Terra Nova
- SLOG
- 3pointD
- ARGNet
- iViNNie
July 25, 2007
July 23, 2007
It Is Hard To Think Of Anything More Surreal Than A Chinese Goldfarmer
by: Lynette Webb
There was a really interesting article in the New York Times recently that looked at the gold-farming phenomenon. For those who don’t know, ‘gold farming’ is the term given to people who play online games like world of warcraft in a manner so as to earn the maximum ‘gold’ which is then sold on to other players who don’t have the time/skills to earn it themselves.
Continue reading "It Is Hard To Think Of Anything More Surreal Than A Chinese Goldfarmer" »
July 12, 2007
Links
Hi and welcome to another installment of "articles you may have missed and you may or may not care about".
First off, The Angry Gamer, an introductory analysis of..well.. trash talking. While not necessarily revealing anything you didn't already know, the author did do his homework and took the subject quite seriously.
June 23, 2007
Virtual Goods Summit 2007 Roundup
Virtual World News has done an excellent job posting a record of the Virtual Goods Summit I mentioned earlier (reLink), and there’s plenty of documentation elsewhere. I’ve not read everything yet but wanted to at least make those people who stop in here - especially Industrial Designers - aware of the interesting and relevant topics being discussed.
May 19, 2007
Quick Note
Starcraft 2. Hell yeah.
May 14, 2007
Playboy Soon in Second Life
Playboy Island in Second Life is opening soon. Look for Playboy in group search, join, and you too can be a playmate (that's the title group members get automatically). I bumped today into someone who said the island was actually open, but when I tried, the teleport failed. Don't you love the island's shape, though? It's one of the few businesses for whom Second Life is a natural fit, given how many of the residents spend most of their time.
Original post: http://adverlab.blogspot.com/2007/05/playboy-soon-in-second-life.html
May 11, 2007
News, Links, Stories
Much to my chagrin, I again find myself in the mindset where anything beyond a small listing of links just won't tick right.
So here we go again. First off, you might've noticed that people started blogging about the latest panic wave that hit Second Life. It took a large portion of my will to refrain from making any comments of any nature, but here's a good observation from csven, picked up from the comments on this post:
May 8, 2007
New Study On Gaming Habits
Via Gamasutra, an NPD report titled "Online Gaming 2007: The Virtual Landscape".
Some data:
- 42% of the gamers are women;
- 54% of online console gamers use the Xbox; PS 2 comes next with a 45%;
- Only 19% of the subjects indicated MMOs as their preffered genre;
- On average, more time is spent playing online on consoles than on PCs/Macs.
Visa Launches World of Warcraft Card
A year ago, Phillip Torrone wrote in MAKE: "Very soon, credit card companies and game makers will reward their customers who spend money in the real world using private label "rewards" credit cards. They will use gifts of virtual currency such as Blizzard's World of Warcraft gold and Second Life's Linden dollars."
May 4, 2007
In Other News
Having been somewhat busy lately, I couldn't find the time for more than briefly scanning my feeds list. Like a good news monkey however, I do have to share those links that caught the eye.
April 24, 2007
MMO Miscellanea
Some MMO-related articles caught my eye because they stray out of the old, beaten path (Where is <game> headed? or What is the next WoW killer? or A new era dawns as patch 5.43.21b is announced).
First off, a Clickable Culture article reinforcing the point that, no matter what you design your game for, there'll be people who'll find new, weird and sometimes interesting uses for it.
Staying in Azeroth, a piece about 'coming of age'. And as horrible as that may sound, the author makes a pretty good point. Yes, it's a game but it's still played by real people, even if they're behind really cartoonish characters.
Finally, a very detailed article by Nick Yee on MMO superstitions. I found it to be a delicious read, although, if you never played a MMO in your life, the post might read more like a psychiatry ward visit.
April 18, 2007
Sim Game Teaches TV Ad Planning
TV Station Manager is an indie game of the simulation / tycoon genre that puts you in the shoes of, surprise, a TV station manager. Wonder if it can be used for training; will run it by the agency's media guys to see how accurate it is. From the game description:
Study: In-Game Ad Spend $295M This Year
More datapoints from the eMarketer study: "eMarketer projects that $295 million of the 2007 total will be spent on in-game advertising and that spending on advergaming (the creation of games for the purpose of promoting a brand) will reach $207 million. By 2011, the balance between the two will have shifted significantly. US spending on advergaming will climb to $344 million in 2011, but US spending on in-game advertising will climb faster, reaching a total of $625 million that year."
-- press release
Original post: http://adverlab.blogspot.com/2007/04/study-in-game-ad-spend-295m-this-year.html
April 16, 2007
Of Browsing and Passive MMOs
When I read about passively multiplayer online games, I immediatly thought about Progress Quest, basically a mock RPG where character creation is pretty much the last interactive part. After that, the game sits quietly in the background and plays itself, basically grinding up a character while you go about your business.
PMOG however is a concept crafted to define the next level. It's a "game" where what you browse defines your character. Quite amusing, really.
April 13, 2007
Game Promo Uses Camera, "Ghosted" Film
It's one of those campaigns I wish I'd thought of first: a promo for a PlayStation 2 game "Forbidden Siren 2" last year in Germany during a game con. They have created branded snapshot cameras loaded with ghosts on a pre-exposed film that appeared on the printed pictures given away to visitors. More pictures at I Believe in Advertising (and so do I).
Original post: http://adverlab.blogspot.com/2007/04/psp-promo-uses-camera-ghosted-film.html
April 10, 2007
Serious Games Are Getting Down To Business
Via: eMarketer.com
The practice of using video games as an advertising vehicle is as old as the games industry itself. Early Sega racing games for the Atari 2600 console featured Marlboro display ads on the raceway, and high-profile early-'90s titles such as Zool and the FIFA International series contained ads for Chupa Chups and Adidas, respectively.
Continue reading "Serious Games Are Getting Down To Business" »
April 6, 2007
eMarketer: Video Games Are Getting Down To Business
eMarketer.com reports:
"In-game advertising will evolve in scope and sophistication, offering new platforms for marketers, new business opportunities for technology providers and vital revenue for game developers, who have struggled with the escalating production costs of increasingly complex games," says eMarketer Senior Analyst Paul Verna, the author of the new Video Game Advertising: Getting to the Next Level report. "eMarketer estimates that over the next five years video game advertising will grow at a compound annual growth rate of nearly 23%, reaching nearly $2 billion by 2011."
Continue reading "eMarketer: Video Games Are Getting Down To Business" »
April 4, 2007
Nine Inch Nails Using Alternate Reality Game (ARG or “Big Game”) To Market New Album
by: Karl Long
I think the concept of marketing using “big games” or ARG’s is one of the most exciting marketing concepts that has emerged in recent years. The way it combines customer experience, co-creation, word of mouth, and customer engagement and lets not forget FUN, makes it a very powerful tool in a marketers repertoire. As Trent says though this is not just about marketing but a new form of entertainment.
April 3, 2007
Ian Bogost on Value of In-Game Ads
Ian Bogost (game designer and researcher, bio, blog) wrote a Gamasutra feature where he talks about the cultural meanings of the branded tokens in the latest Monopoly: Here & Now edition and what lessons can be extracted by video game designers:
April 2, 2007
Conference Notes From Virtual Worlds 2007
by: Karl Long
An old friend and colleague just sent me these notes he had written up for the Virtual Worlds 2007 conference that just took place in NY.
main point being there is a lot of stuff happening out there and SecondLife is just one player.
DEFINING QUOTES:
“We are at the silent movie stage.”
“This is one freaky, geeky 21st century we are moving into.”
“A lot of this is going to happen and a lot of it is not going to happen.”
Continue reading "Conference Notes From Virtual Worlds 2007" »
March 30, 2007
AdAge Discovers DIY Games
AdAge writes about tools that let players create their own games: "What it is: The next wave of user-generated content?" No. Levels, quests, environments and entire games are some of the oldest forms of digital "user-generated" content. The other such form is pr0n.
March 28, 2007
Visa in "The Game of Life"
USA Today: "This summer, "plastic" will replace cash in the new edition of the nation's second-most-popular board game. Last year, in Europe, Visa replaced money in a Monopoly game." It's the upcoming "The Game of Life: Twists and Turns" by Hasbro's Milton Bradley.
Earlier:
New Monopoly Edition Comes with Branded Tokens
Monopoly Switches to Plastic
Concept: Advertising with RFIDed Toys
Original post: http://adverlab.blogspot.com/2007/03/visa-in-game-of-life.html
March 26, 2007
9dragons, Part I: 5wastedhours
Some time ago, this blog (among many others), announced Acclaim's intentions of producing MMOs that'll be free of charge and supported by ads. While my heart didn't exactly start racing and I Wasn' imagining myself a future of nectar and ambrosia, where one can find a host of great MMOs to get addicted to for free, just at the cost of having to see an ad or two, I did make some notes about it.
March 10, 2007
Oh, WoW...
We all know World of Warcraft, right? It's all over the internet so chances are, even if you never played a MMO in your life, you still heard about it. It's that game that gets people hooked faster than you can blink. Of course, as with any big thing, it has its detractors, still, the game has alot to offer to alot of different categories. Yes, the quests are dull and repetitive, yes, roleplaying (in the purist meaning of the word) is all but rubbish for the most part, yet somehow, the game's mix has the certain je ne sais quoi that fascinates. Mind you, I only say 'je ne sais quoi' as a figure of speech, the game has been debated and analyzed in more articles than you'd ever want to read. Eitherway, Warcraft's not the only thing I want to talk about, but I'll just use it at a start point for a few musings on MMOs and such. And if that doesn't appeal to you, there's screenshots!
Me, as seen on www.uglybatriders.com
February 14, 2007
More V-Lodge here
January 29, 2007
Reverse Product Placement in Games
BrandWeek has a follow-up on David Edery's HRB piece on reverse product placement in games (see David's earlier post on the topic, my old post on the fictional brand Sprunk in Grand Theft Auto, and a summary of the HBR article in Gamasutra). What's reverse product placement (I call it "proxy branding") ? BrandWeek writes: "While traditional product placement refers to integrating a real brand into a fictional environment, an idea that's gaining traction is to create a fictional brand in a fictional environment and then release it into the real world."
January 26, 2007
NASCAR Gets 3-D
NY Times On Ads In Games
New York Times has a good story on ads in games, focused on the well known Big Fish Games and PopCap Games. Read it here.
January 22, 2007
Early Edition
Opening my feed reader today, I ran into an article that, for a few moments, made me wonder if I didn't land in a show like Early Edition. Blimey, even the cat's a tabby, it all makes sense!
Study: Brands in Virtual Laguna Beach
"MTV's 4-month-old virtual world has been testing advertiser integrations with Cingular, Pepsi and Procter & Gamble's Secret. So far, according to MTV, 350,000 registered users are spending an average of 36 minutes on each visit."
January 18, 2007
No Ads On My Battery!
Found an article on in-game advertising over on 411mania.com.
January 16, 2007
In The News: Buy More Lizards!
First off, as you know, The Burning Crusade was released today. As one who managed to shrug free of the damn virus a while ago, all I can say for now is "great, now I'll never see my friends again". Bloody addicts, the lot of them!
Now then, it looks like IBM is once again pushing tennis into Second Life. Here's a video:
Now then, it looks like IBM is once again pushing tennis into Second Life. Here's a video:
January 12, 2007
Burger King Sells 2 Million Game Copies in 4 Weeks
Burger King "announced that its trio of games for the Xbox and Xbox 360 had broken the 2 million mark in just four weeks" (GameSpot).
Continue reading "Burger King Sells 2 Million Game Copies in 4 Weeks" »