I think that ads in games would be wildly different than TV ads. TV advertising has to stop the show to display a full commercial from their sponsors. With in-game ads, the pictures shown above sound much more reasonable. On the other hand, though, this is the same as companies advertising on Nascar vehicles.
I think games have a huge amount of space to support ads. For one, the customer base is huge, and it keeps growing. Secondly, the graphics behind the most recent games allows for enough detail for players to clearly see ads in the game scenes. Thirdly, you don't have to pause a game somewhere during the action to display ads, either - just put it in the scene.
Imagine you're playing a FPS and sniping an enemy AI character, and he takes a long drink from a bottle of Gatorade, just as he's about to get shot. Or what if, in Doom, the trophied BFG9000 gun had the word Boeing on its side? That would be huge advertising for Boeing. Or what if you're playing a game similar to The Sims, and while you're choosing what furniture to buy, the brand names are listed with them? Or how about having billboards in a city-scape game with real-life ads on them? Or have a TV in a FPS scene with ads playing on it? The possibilities goes on and on - and none of that is distracting the actual gameplay.
The only trouble I see with this type of advertising is that the companies don't have an opportunity to describe their products. With a 30-second window of TV or radio airtime, companies get a chance to provide plenty of info about their products, sales and their company. This could probably be squeezed into a loading period or any moment the player is waiting, but these things would be much more valuable to a company.
I think games have a huge amount of space to support ads. For one, the customer base is huge, and it keeps growing. Secondly, the graphics behind the most recent games allows for enough detail for players to clearly see ads in the game scenes. Thirdly, you don't have to pause a game somewhere during the action to display ads, either - just put it in the scene.
Imagine you're playing a FPS and sniping an enemy AI character, and he takes a long drink from a bottle of Gatorade, just as he's about to get shot. Or what if, in Doom, the trophied BFG9000 gun had the word Boeing on its side? That would be huge advertising for Boeing. Or what if you're playing a game similar to The Sims, and while you're choosing what furniture to buy, the brand names are listed with them? Or how about having billboards in a city-scape game with real-life ads on them? Or have a TV in a FPS scene with ads playing on it? The possibilities goes on and on - and none of that is distracting the actual gameplay.
The only trouble I see with this type of advertising is that the companies don't have an opportunity to describe their products. With a 30-second window of TV or radio airtime, companies get a chance to provide plenty of info about their products, sales and their company. This could probably be squeezed into a loading period or any moment the player is waiting, but these things would be much more valuable to a company.