Advertising and Games

Means of PersuasionProcedurality

◦Procedural rhetoric = rhetoric of a system

◦The use of unit operations, systems, rules, and procedures to persuade or express.

Visuals◦Graphics, editing

Audio◦Music, sound effects

Words◦Print, spoken

Games are systemsGames are systems—they are a

combination of rules and units—they embody procedural rhetoric.◦Games have persuasive qualities,

and some games are designed to be persuasive.

What makes procedural rhetoric better/worse/different at persuasion than static or linear forms?

ADVERTISING

Types of in-game advertisingCommercial off-the-shelf games have advertising

• Licensing and Product Placement. This perpetuates a recursive network—deepened relationship with product. Game increases exposure to product, exposure increases game sales.◦Licensing – sponsoring producer or

representative product within game. Illustrative and associative

◦Product Placement – placement of product in game. A soda machine, baseball bat, or clothing line. Also, static/linear advertisement in game.

HOWEVER…

We are focusing on advergames:

An Advergame is a game whose sole purpose is to promote a service, product, or brand. Any game created specifically to host a procedural rhetoric about the claims a company wants to make about its service, products or its brand.

Three modes in advertising1. Demonstrative – communicate tangibles about the nature of a

product Demonstrations, simulations, and/or descriptions of product “Let me show or tell you how it works”

http://www.ford.com/cars/mustang/customizer/

Advergames: Use of product in game; descriptions in game.

2. Illustrative – indirect information through presentation of product in social or cultural context

Object used or referred to in context, but sometimes incidental to gameplay or used in novel way.

“Play hockey using a lifesaver as a puck” Advergames: Communicate existence of the product through

gameplay◦ http://crazysquares.com/games.html

3. Associative – indirect; focusing on the context/social and intangibles.

Lifestyle marketing; associating product with who buyer wants to be.

“Play pool on this cool Jack Daniel’s Pool Table.” Advergames: Relate product with game/lifestyle

http://www.happymeal.com

Ads can use multiple strategiesNot mutually exclusive

◦Sometimes an ad can be demonstrative, illustrative, and associative.

◦Rarely is an ad equal parts demonstrative, illustrative and associative.

◦We look at the focus of the ad—what is its primary means of communicating.

Advertising StrategiesDemonstrative, Illustrative,

Associative?◦Slap Chop◦Camel Cigarettes◦Heineken

Great games……but are they great

advergames?The Coke Zero GameGet the Glass!

Who created whom?“Mass media allowed companies

to manufacture wants rather than satisfy needs” (Bogost 150).

“Advertisers focus on the procedural rhetoric of the frames themselves—integrating ads into rules of consumers’ perceived cultural station” (Bogost 152).

Advergame: $10,000 – $400,000

Primetime commercial: $100,000 – $200,000

30 second spot

Playing food advergames led to

children eating more (Folkvord et al., 2012)

30 commercials run during an hour long TV

program

Dorito’s Hotel 626 won 8 awards, and videos on YouTube of people playing have reached

over 1 million hits

AdvergamesFocus on advergames for this

assignment because they (can/should) are based on procedural rhetoric.

They are “persuasive” games. Persuasive games foreground a product, lesson, or ideology.