Wipeout HD Patch Introduces In-Game Ads, Promtly Removes Them

There's no easy way to say it other than just stating the obvious: Wipeout HD had in-game commercials yesterday, but doesn't today. Even though it launched at premium price and has relatively pricey DLC, the futuristic racer included various ads that didn't exactly blend into the game's highly designed look until everyone that saw them complained about it. I guess only Sony couldn't see inconsistency between floating race cars with rockets and an ad for State Farm insurance?

So how many ads were there and how often did people see them yesterday? The sleuths over at Gamasutra found some footage that showed these ads taking up to twice as long as level loads before the ad-filled patch. But doing worry, according to reports people only had to watch them three times to five times every hour.

When I first heard about these ads, I was enraged that Sony would pull a sleazy stunt like this. This wouldn't be an issue if the game was initially released with ads or if this was a "lite" version of the game which would sell for a reduced price, but patching this type of thing into games that people have already purchased is a level of tacky I didn't think existed. Having recently played through Bionic Commando my tolerance for in-game advertising might be at an all time low, but we're not talking about something minor like billboards in the middle of a city here. This was an obtrusive disservice to their customers that negatively impacted gameplay. I'm glad that Sony had the good sense to remove these ads as soon as they saw the negative press they received for it, but I'm more than a little worried that this was able to escape their testing and quality assurance departments without someone raising a stink about it. Also, I'm still a little miffed that they only plan to remove the "Loading" ads, but leaving the rest of the advertising in.

Double Fusion, the ad company backing Sony up on this, mentioned in their press release that they will be introducing more in-game ads into other PS3 titles in the near future. It's anybody's guess how this fiasco will factor into their plans, but if I have to watch Nathan Drake taking time outs for a can of Mountain Dew: Code Red in between levels of Uncharted 2 I'll be servery disappointed.

[Double Fusion Brings In-Game Ads To Wipeout HD] Gamasutra