The combination games + marketing is hot online with advergames, in the wireless world with wireless advergames, and offline, with videogames product placement. In the recent years product placement has invaded Hollywood, and now is ready to massively land on videogames. GameSpot published last week an article about marketing and games, talking to Ubisoft's director of media and promotions, Jill Steinberg who said:
"Varied, layered marketing tactics--from the Internet to contests--are the goal for many consumer-brand companies. The true success of marketing tie-ins in the near future hinges on more than just featuring the product in the game."
As in the movies, I believe the point is to build a campaign around a game and not a game concept around a product. Advertising money has a lot of power but not necessarily this power is able to help the industry growing from a quality point of view.
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