Massive Launches In-Game Advertising Network

Representatives from Massive Incorporated have announced that the company’s video game advertising network has completed its beta testing phase, and will now expand into 40 new titles from 10 different game publishers, before the year’s end, with its first set of prominent advertisers and games officially announced. The major brands represented, each paying for a chance to be advertised within video games, will include Coca-Cola, Comcast's G4, Dunkin' Donuts, Honda Element & Honda S2000, Intel, Nestle, Paramount Pictures, T-Mobile, Universal Music Group and Verizon. Current titles in the Massive network include Ubisoft's Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory and Funcom's PC MMO Anarchy Online, as well as Mall Tycoon and Ski Resort. The adverts are used contextually, and include billboards of movie posters for Paramount Pictures' forthcoming movie The Longest Yard in Splinter Cell. Some more contemporary ads in futuristic games, such as adverts for Diet Sprite Zero or the new Motley Crue album in Anarchy Online, which is set 30,000 years into the future, can look somewhat incongruous, according to some online observers. However, since Funcom is now allowing users to play the game without the need for a subscription fee, partially thanks to this deal, complaints over advertising in this particular case are expected to be scant. In addition to creating the network and technical infrastructure to deliver advertising contextually into video games, Massive has formed a strategic partnership with Nielsen Interactive Entertainment, who will provide third-party accountability and measurement for video game advertising through the Massive Network.