General Discussion

Ncsoft has announced that they have partnered with Double Fusion to provide optional in game advertising in City of Heroes / Villains, with the revenue generated from the ads to be reinvested into the game.

Today we announced our partnership with Double Fusion to provide optional in-game advertising for City of Heroes. I wanted take some time to share some details beyond those in the press release.

In-game advertising is something that we have carefully considered ever since the initial release of City of Heroes in 2004. From our perspective it always came down to a few fundamental questions: Will this technology make our game experience more immersive or less immersive? In other words, is City of Heroes an appropriate environment for it? In-game advertising in other MMOs has sometimes been received as an unwelcome addition, so could we actually find ways to make this a significant win for our customers? And with the plan of reinvesting all the revenue that we make from this, how much will this single (optional in-game advertising) initiative actually allow us to grow our development team?

These are complex questions that can’t necessarily be answered with 100% certainty, but after discussing this for a number of years we believe we’ve found the right partner to bring ads to the game while being sensitive to our community’s needs. I want to make it very clear that we are not “forcing” in-game ads upon our players. Thus, the word “optional” is of key importance. None of our players have to change their game experience in any way if that’s what they prefer. All that you need to do is opt-out via the Options menu in the game.

Read more here.

 Is actually a great idea.

   The world setting is perfect for it and i dont believe will break game immersion as much.

   Plus looking at the track record of the writers from missions, story arcs and so on  am looking forward to see the funny and witty wording the billboards ads will bring to the CoX world.

   Also that means more revenue for Ncsoft  which  in turn will bring more  Free  Issues and content (in my opinion) to the players

Win=Win  situations for both

Not at all excited about the news but at least they give the players an option to turn it off.

As long as its in game billboards, etc I don't mind. I just don't want "IN YOUR FACE" advertising on the login pages.

Whatever they have to do to make the game better without charging me more is fine with me to  a limit.   I agree I don't want in your face adverts.  

The keyword is optional. As long as one can choose whether they want to view the adverts or not, everyone wins.

im not a big advocate of ads in games in fact I despise them. nothing worse than seeing streaming ads of axe, prison break posters (see swat 4 for major example) R6 vegas did this, but Ill admit the single player was pretty memorable but i wasnt happy to learn it too had ads, or else I would of threw it back in the face of the best buy manager and demanded my money back. funny to is the fact it has small print. but anyways im getting off track here.

the only sunshine on this storm is the fact that they make it optional, its not forced onto the player who is paying $14.99 for a ad free environment. i think they are intrusive, demanding, and downright guady. will this improve NCsofts bottom line and bring better content for the game? only time will tell, but I must commend them on allowing it to be optional. at least i have a choice in the matter so ill give them kudos for that. and if it indeed brings more higher quality content, who knows it may very well work, and NCsoft proved that t does. but once again only time will tell, Ill have to sit back and watch a bit.

The only way I'd every allow/accept in-game ads is if they substantially lowered the monthly fees, or even dropped them to F2P.  I don't mind them in AO, since I'm a froob there, and I consider ads there the perfect "price" to pay for playing for free.

If CoH becomes F2P with ad supported revenues, then I'll reinstall the game today.

Oy.

revenue generated from the ads to be reinvested into the game

LOL, yea right, next thing I'll probably hear is some fake story about a famous rapper turning mormon.

So... When you buy the CoH/CoV collection you cant try the free month that is included without paying for a gamecard first, or giving them full access to your credit card... And now they want full monthly fee for watching ads and commersials ingame. Pay to be be a marketing victim... Good work

I think thats enough junk for one company, thank you very much.

Keeping it fiction will be very fun.

We've all seen the same boards up for years...but now there will be more creativity out there.

I hope the advertisers know the game so that the boards will be relevant in each zone.

As long as they are smart about it, it could be a fun addition.