In-game Advertising?

[Scourge]

Just say NO

No to adverts in game, no adverts, adware or data tracking, none at all. I hate internet advertising with a passion, 80% of the time It looks like a scam of some sort .

I've been waiting a bloody long time for this game so there's no danger of me boycotting the game for the moment but I'm going to be all kinds of annoyed if in-game advertising even begins to make a nuisance of itself.

If it's subtle and ignorable I might just be able to tolerate it, even then I suspect it won't last. Regardless, if I can't blackhole the ad-servers and/or opt out or block external ads in any way I will just say goodbye to multiplayer and prevent anything from FD communicating with the internet, period.

Just the thought of hearing an ad jingle in game is making me furious!

 

[-o-]

I must be missing something here (more than the usual few screws) ..

As part of the KS, did FD ever state that they needed additional, ongoing, funding to maintain ED?

I think I remember them saying something about the possibility of low level MTs, but nothing more.

Did we not already fund ED and the 2 expansions?

Spoiler

Will I have to pay for updates, or expansions, or new content?

Some new features and content will be paid for, especially those that build significantly on the game. If you have pledged to £90 tier or higher then any expansions or updates are free.


Will the game be free to play after the initial purchase?

We do not plan to make it subscription-based. Once you have purchased the game up front, you will be able to play thereafter for no further cost. Everything in the game will be purchasable with in-game Credits, earned from trading, bounty-hunting, etc. We will probably allow the supplemental purchase of Credits with real money, for those who want to accelerate their progress through the game.

Does this not mean that once the £1,250,000 goal was reached, FD had already taken into account the maintainance and development costs till at least the expansion releases?

Why do people keep saying that ED needs ongoing financial support to maintain or further develop the game - that was all part of the budget we provided ....... wasn't it?

 

[Exmortis]

I think if they did it in a tasteful/non-immersion-breaking way it would be fine. I'm all for FD making money as long as they don't screw up the game by breaking immersion. There's already ads for companies that are in Elite lore - I don't see the issue maybe adding a few more that exist in real life. Think Bladerunner with all the advertisements it had - it was part of the setting and worked.

 

[natte hond]

most of you seem to think there will be any time invested in how its going to be fit into the game.
this to me is highly unlikely.
certainly so if its going to be based upon your own location and IP.
I find it far more likely these are going to be the same banners you see in your own browser everyday.
those are based upon where your ip has been and what you look for on the internet.
or simply the country you life in.
like I see Dutch commercials in my twitch streams and you do not.
I wouldn't be surprised that the time we have now for looking at an orange ship is going to be filled with these.
hopefully the exposure to these advertisements is going to be based upon how much you invested into the game.
I feel high investors should be free of them and get the game we have been waiting for for so long.
without immersion breaking abflex commercials.

 

[Rog]

This is all very well, but the choice appears:

• Submit to tracking, spam and targeted ads and all the rest, or
• You are banished to single-player forever.

Don't like it? Tough!

What's next?

 

[Herik]

First anyone outside of alpha's heard about this?

Personally, I think it stinks.

Seems to be rather all-encompassing.

I do not want any advertiser to have any details about me whatsoever thank you very much (or eat into my bandwidth or data allowance), and do my level best to ensure they get as little data from me as possible.

Come on FD - what kind of crappy ad spam are we now to expect in the game?

Agree Rog!

 

[Stoo]

I remember there was a thread (not sure where) on ads in game, and many people said it was OK as long as it's not 'current', as in it would be brands but based in a thousand years from now... So Coke, Ford, MacD's would be OK, but not Ford's latest car, or current MacD offers....

These would be on billboards in the stations, and on pylons outside the stations and possibly at hyperspace markers...

 

[Rog]

I remember there was a thread (not sure where) on ads in game, and many people said it was OK as long as it's not 'current', as in it would be brands but based in a thousand years from now... So Coke, Ford, MacD's would be OK, but not Ford's latest car, or current MacD offers....

These would be on billboards in the stations, and on pylons outside the stations and possibly at hyperspace markers...

But it would appear that the advertisements are going to be streamed from a very current day third-party targeted ads company (sorry, "Dynamic Advertising Provider").

You can forget any notion of trumble ointment and Ford Hypercar 3000 adverts.

 

[Exmortis]

Just keep in mind the more lucrative game development is, especially the type of games you enjoy, the more of those games you will get and at higher quality. It's basic economics. If it doesn't hurt the game too much we should be all for FD and other game companies making all the money they possibly can.

 

[-o-]

Well, by that logic, SC will be 20x better than ED

 

[Exmortis]

Well, by that logic, SC will be 20x better than ED

Not really the same logic...but it would stand to reason if SC after all is said and done is considered a runaway financial success you will see others trying to do better. It's a bit early yet, even though with all the money they've taken in one could argue it's already a financial success if they shut their doors now. Still, it takes a little time for the market to react.

 

[-o-]

Money, or the lack of it, does not mean you meet a quality standard.

Just look at my husband ..... as poor as a mouse, but cooks a cumberland pie to die for.

 

[Exmortis]

Money, or the lack of it, does not mean you meet a quality standard.

Just look at my husband ..... as poor as a mouse, but cooks a cumberland pie to die for.

We aren't talking about the same things. When looking at any market, the more lucrative it is the more active/competitive it is (with the obvious exception of monopolies such as some utilities). Competition improves quality. There are very few exceptions to this. This is something entirely different than saying a person's skills are dependent upon how much money they have, which of course isn't true.

 

[Cosmos]

I have no problem with in game advertising of real world prodcuts, provided it's done with a level of sensetivity.

Maybe an add in the loading bay, which in the Alpha already exists for non existent, future products & companies.

If there was an add for Virgin Galactic it wouldn't be to bad. But an add for BT or AT&T would be terrible (doubly so, because I'm Australian .... and no, that doesn't mean I want an ad for Telstra either). I can also see Coke Cola being available 1,000 years in the future. But not barkleys bank. They have to get the right products being advertised.

Having said all that, it's probably standard boiler plate stuff so that Frontier can monetise the game in some manner and say "Yeah well, we DID tell you we might do this".

Considering Frontier

1. Have to make a profit
2. Aren't charging a monthly subscription fee
3. Seem to be carefully stepping around micro-transaction

there aren't to many other options left open for ongoing financial support for them.

In game advertising of real world products would be awful. I see enough of that crap every day and it would really spoil immersion and the games identity. We did raise the EULA in the DDF a while back but no one at Frontier commented upon it.

It might well be true its just a standard EULA agreement, cut and paste job sort of thing, but without clarification its difficult not to be suspicious. I don't think Frontier are idiots when it comes to understanding the overall sentiment of the player base and I agree that creating a palatable funding stream for the game is going to be a difficult one so as to not alienate us all.

Lets hope they come up with something in the end that we can live with and offers a good income for them so they can continue to develop the game and make their investors happy. Time will tell..

 

[MiNi]

I absolutely hate the way we are spammed daily with advertising every day where ever we are and look, so i have tried to make my daily life as addfree as possibel.
NO to adds in my mail, Basic airgrabbed TV in denmak is addfree, so i cancled the expensive and addinfested TVpackage and so on.
Reading about this part of the legal text, make me regret i bought premium beta.
Surely would not have bought P-beta if this was likely to happen.
When i play Elite i want to relax and enjoy myself, and adds would totally spoil that for me. Some not real life adds in space station is ok if they are funny.

ED with real life advertising

 

[Dejay]

Probably we'll get advertising in cooperation with facebook! They'll use your in game behavior to show you the best adverts. If you play always friendly and never shoot other players you'll get adverts for "care bear" teddy bears, and if you are a pirate they'll show you adds for anonymous newsgroup server access. Bounty hunters will get advertising for knives and stuff!

Haha just trolling, probably this is just a reused eula that some laweyer drew up some while ago. I bet it's the same as some other frontier game. We assume that we are the only ones who never read EULA's (except the OP of course)... no developers don't read them either! In theory this should be a reason for refund, if you paid for the game without seeing the EULA.

 

[nats]

Considering I cant watch Channel 4 or 5 now due to ridiculous amount of adverts I have to put up with (trying to watch The Walking Dead just got impossibly frustrating) I certainly hope the same thing isnt going to happen here. I love seeing the pretend in game adverts and dont mind those at all. But if real boring present day advertising certainly this is one thing that could stop me playing the game.

I still have this awful feeling that this glorious game will come crashing down for some stupid reason like this .... often I find things are too good to be true.

 

[Iskariot]

This is a bit worrying to be honest.
If the advertising gets immersion breaking or intrusive I am out, even though I have been waiting for this game for 2 decades. I virtually stopped watching television because of the disgusting amount of advertizing and I would drop elite like a turd without thinking twice if the advertizing irritated me.

I can live with it if the advertising is done tastefully, non-immersion breaking. I do expect to see game related adverts anyway, like in a cyberpunk universe (Bladerunner). I want to see in-game corporations trying to sell me their ships, ship upgrades, weaponry, software etc.

I do not want to see advertising for products that can not possibly fit the futuristic Elite universe. I do not ever want an ingame character to persuade me to buy a DLC for the game itself for example (Dragon age) not because I do not want that DLC (I want all of them ) but because that would be ridiculous and immersion breaking. Neither would I accept advertisements for current day products like a Toyota Prius, an iPhone 6 or a Playstation 4. On the other hand I would be able to see humor in an advert for a Playstation 40437.

 

[Aussiedroid]

Wow I certainly did open a can of worms on this one Didn't think it would be such a hot topic tbh.

Seems most of you would accept some form of adverts in-game as long as they are fictional or a futuristic product from existing company and fit the game universe. Anything current 21st century seems to be a no, no.

Seems most of you do not want tracking or other means to track ads to you. Although I cannot see how your in-game actions would trigger certain adverts really.

Some have mentioned that FD need to make money ongoing, well off course but I hope from new customers buying the game not from those supporters who have already bought the game and more to get this funded - I think we have paid our dues so to speak and squeezing more money from us via advertising is a bit tasteless. I'm not a fan of micro transactions really but that looks far more appealing than being advertised to.

As a few others mentioned, I also think it would be unlikely they would use this to the detrement of the player base if it was to detract from the game, but the fact is that we have all accepted the EULA so if FD wanted to do this they could, same with the data collection.

Would be really good to get some official word on this to save speculation and put our concerns to rest. Its probably nothing, but I can't help but to assume the worst when I read T&Cs like this and being the most anticipated game in years for me I would hate to see it ruined by greed.

 

[metatheurgist]

Did we not already fund ED and the 2 expansions?

Does this not mean that once the £1,250,000 goal was reached, FD had already taken into account the maintainance and development costs till at least the expansion releases?

Why do people keep saying that ED needs ongoing financial support to maintain or further develop the game - that was all part of the budget we provided ....... wasn't it?

From a quick search the average budget of a AAA game title is $23M. FD have some advantage since they own their own engine and are publishing their own game. So I'd say that the £1.25M doesn't cover further expansions and on-going server costs. SC with their $40M+ budget is probably fully covered, which probably explains why they are now just adding stupid stretch goals for everything.