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Advertising sells games. That's a fact. Make a game look amazing, cool, and show it off in a way that will win the majority vote, and like a far-eastern country and the release of a new console, people will literally queue up all night outside their local outlets to be one of the first people to play the game!
Some companies don't even need to bother advertising, but they still go ahead and do it, and they'll reach that many more sales and reap the benefits, such as Sony and their extensive advertising campaign for the Playstation 2 around it's release. Microsoft made an impact with one of their adverts for the Xbox despite sales being low. It still got people talking, and even got the advert banned, which in turn shows a 'mature' image that gamers seem to love.
Nintendo, however, seem to be half-hearted with advertising. It is almost as if they feel that if a game is worth buying, it doesn't need advertising. Obviously, they advertise their games enough to get the word out by way of magazine adverts and showing bits of their games on their websites, but it is the television audience that get the most notice.
Nintendo initially set off to a good start. Adverts appeared nearly all the time on the main channels advertising all Nintendo's own launch titles, and the occasional third party title, whilst advertising the actual GameCube at the same time, however, lately Nintendo seem to advertise on the odd occasion on the lesser popular channels, most probably because the costs of advertising are cheaper.
But that's not what I want to get into a dispute about. What I have noticed, as a trend that is appearing in most television videogame adverts, is that the adverts focus more on an image, than the game itself. For example, the main Playstation 2 advert hardly showed anything about the Playstation 2 at all, mainly focusing on some random special effects that the console could never produce anyway, much alike the Xbox advert with the fast aging person who's born and dies within a matter of seconds. Even Nintendo's adverts seemed to focus more on special effects than the games themselves, but showed more ingame footage than the other two system's adverts.
There are some third party companies that seem to have the right idea about advertising though. But only some. One example appears to be the Rayman 3 advert for the Nintendo GameCube. Although only focusing on the GameCube version, the majority of the advert shows the game itself, and not some stupid real life acting. The Grand Theft Auto Vice City advert also stodd out as one of the better, even though I don't really like the game, as it showed ingame footage, and played music from the game. It showed you enough of what the game involved to make you want to see more, without showing too little of the game which could be missed if you blink...
...which leads me to the not so good adverts. One for example is The Getaway's advert. The majority of it involves some guy walking along a corridor with a phone ringing. It shows the odd half second of game footage, then it goes back to the man walking down the corridor, phone still ringing, and eventually he picks up the phone. As he does so, about two seconds of game footage is shown before the end of the advert. It has to be said that even if the game is good, the advert is pretty pathetic. It made me think, "Wow...a phone is ringing...and a bloke answers it...where's the fun in that?"
It's the adverts that get you thinking about the game that get people to buy the game. Although partially going against my argument, Nintendo made a pretty good advertising campaign for Super Mario Land 3: Wario Land on the original GameBoy years ago. When the advert was shown on TV, it was a time where nearly everyone was addicted to Super Mario World on the Super Nintendo, and so Nintendo didn't need to show ingame footage. It basically showed us Wario, Nitnendo's then brand new villian, boasting about how he is so much better than Mario, and so, because people had it in their heads that they were going to be playing a game even better than Super Mario World, people rushed out to buy it!
Going back to what I was saying earlier, if companies actually showed off their games in adverts, people would subconciously be imagining playing them, and so would want to give them a proper try. In Japan, this actually does happen, and as we all know, with the exception of a certain American console company whom the Japanese still aren't too sure about, games and consoles seem to sell a heck of a lot more there! That is because the Japanese are programmed to crave technology. Why? Because technology is shoved down their throats (metaphorically I must add) every second of the day! But not only technology, but games. The adverts in Japan are so much better than those shown in the UK!
There was one advert in Japan that was similar in style to that of the bonus demo disc Nintendo released for PC usage in late March 2002. It starts off showing the console in the middle of the screen, a hand grabs the handle very quickly with 'boing thwoop' sound effect playing, and some American dude says "Game-a-Cube". Then a load of videogame footage is shown for many games! Those who still have the disc Nintendo released in the UK might remember the Crazy Taxi, Extreme G and Tony Hawk's 3 footage for example, well Japan, a little more recently, but still quite a while back, were shown early footage of games still in development, like Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles for example. This is showing the Japanese gamers what they want to see. Quality games in development and due for release on a brilliant system.
What is even better for advertising is showing lots of fast paced action footage ripped straight from the game in question, with very little time being shown for anything else. Thanks to er-no pointing me to a website containing an advert like this, I was able to see the GameCube version of Soul Calibur 2 how it is advertised on Japanese TV. The advert shows one of Nintendo's most popular games characters, Link (although more slitty-eyed than I can remember), in various poses before he rapidly slices and dices most other characters featured in Soul Calibur 2 at very high speeds with his Master Sword. Meanwhile, in this thirty second advert, there's a Japanese voice-over sounding orgasmicly excited as he says whatever he's saying, as well as one of the better versions of The Legend of Zelda's theme playing to the footage. At most, only a second is used to show the game's name, the format it is for and the price, as everyone knows what format it is for if it has Link in it, and everyone knows the average price of a game, so that doens't need to be focused upon.
I have to admit that the Soul Calibur 2 advert is one of the best adverts for a videogame I've ever had the pleasure of viewing, even if it is only online. The fact is, it shows the game in all it's glory, it makes it out to be very exciting, and doesn't lead you into any false sense of anything else. Plus, with so much footage shown, it stays in the mind more! That's how adverts should be.
Is the reason us western types get the rubbishy adverts with very little game footage because the developers are afraid? Do they fear that we, the consumers, will think worse of the games if we see them in action? After all, I don't think 'The Third Place' adverts with a talking humanoid duck would really make me want a Playstation 2. (Note: It wasn't the advertising campaign that sold the PS2) The main thing taht put me off even thinking of getting the PS2 was the fact that most of the release games weren't even worth bothering with, or so the many forms of media kept telling me. If the games are good, they're worth showing off. Show off the good games, and they will sell well.
Some companies don't even need to bother advertising, but they still go ahead and do it, and they'll reach that many more sales and reap the benefits, such as Sony and their extensive advertising campaign for the Playstation 2 around it's release. Microsoft made an impact with one of their adverts for the Xbox despite sales being low. It still got people talking, and even got the advert banned, which in turn shows a 'mature' image that gamers seem to love.
Nintendo, however, seem to be half-hearted with advertising. It is almost as if they feel that if a game is worth buying, it doesn't need advertising. Obviously, they advertise their games enough to get the word out by way of magazine adverts and showing bits of their games on their websites, but it is the television audience that get the most notice.
Nintendo initially set off to a good start. Adverts appeared nearly all the time on the main channels advertising all Nintendo's own launch titles, and the occasional third party title, whilst advertising the actual GameCube at the same time, however, lately Nintendo seem to advertise on the odd occasion on the lesser popular channels, most probably because the costs of advertising are cheaper.
But that's not what I want to get into a dispute about. What I have noticed, as a trend that is appearing in most television videogame adverts, is that the adverts focus more on an image, than the game itself. For example, the main Playstation 2 advert hardly showed anything about the Playstation 2 at all, mainly focusing on some random special effects that the console could never produce anyway, much alike the Xbox advert with the fast aging person who's born and dies within a matter of seconds. Even Nintendo's adverts seemed to focus more on special effects than the games themselves, but showed more ingame footage than the other two system's adverts.
There are some third party companies that seem to have the right idea about advertising though. But only some. One example appears to be the Rayman 3 advert for the Nintendo GameCube. Although only focusing on the GameCube version, the majority of the advert shows the game itself, and not some stupid real life acting. The Grand Theft Auto Vice City advert also stodd out as one of the better, even though I don't really like the game, as it showed ingame footage, and played music from the game. It showed you enough of what the game involved to make you want to see more, without showing too little of the game which could be missed if you blink...
...which leads me to the not so good adverts. One for example is The Getaway's advert. The majority of it involves some guy walking along a corridor with a phone ringing. It shows the odd half second of game footage, then it goes back to the man walking down the corridor, phone still ringing, and eventually he picks up the phone. As he does so, about two seconds of game footage is shown before the end of the advert. It has to be said that even if the game is good, the advert is pretty pathetic. It made me think, "Wow...a phone is ringing...and a bloke answers it...where's the fun in that?"
It's the adverts that get you thinking about the game that get people to buy the game. Although partially going against my argument, Nintendo made a pretty good advertising campaign for Super Mario Land 3: Wario Land on the original GameBoy years ago. When the advert was shown on TV, it was a time where nearly everyone was addicted to Super Mario World on the Super Nintendo, and so Nintendo didn't need to show ingame footage. It basically showed us Wario, Nitnendo's then brand new villian, boasting about how he is so much better than Mario, and so, because people had it in their heads that they were going to be playing a game even better than Super Mario World, people rushed out to buy it!
Going back to what I was saying earlier, if companies actually showed off their games in adverts, people would subconciously be imagining playing them, and so would want to give them a proper try. In Japan, this actually does happen, and as we all know, with the exception of a certain American console company whom the Japanese still aren't too sure about, games and consoles seem to sell a heck of a lot more there! That is because the Japanese are programmed to crave technology. Why? Because technology is shoved down their throats (metaphorically I must add) every second of the day! But not only technology, but games. The adverts in Japan are so much better than those shown in the UK!
There was one advert in Japan that was similar in style to that of the bonus demo disc Nintendo released for PC usage in late March 2002. It starts off showing the console in the middle of the screen, a hand grabs the handle very quickly with 'boing thwoop' sound effect playing, and some American dude says "Game-a-Cube". Then a load of videogame footage is shown for many games! Those who still have the disc Nintendo released in the UK might remember the Crazy Taxi, Extreme G and Tony Hawk's 3 footage for example, well Japan, a little more recently, but still quite a while back, were shown early footage of games still in development, like Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles for example. This is showing the Japanese gamers what they want to see. Quality games in development and due for release on a brilliant system.
What is even better for advertising is showing lots of fast paced action footage ripped straight from the game in question, with very little time being shown for anything else. Thanks to er-no pointing me to a website containing an advert like this, I was able to see the GameCube version of Soul Calibur 2 how it is advertised on Japanese TV. The advert shows one of Nintendo's most popular games characters, Link (although more slitty-eyed than I can remember), in various poses before he rapidly slices and dices most other characters featured in Soul Calibur 2 at very high speeds with his Master Sword. Meanwhile, in this thirty second advert, there's a Japanese voice-over sounding orgasmicly excited as he says whatever he's saying, as well as one of the better versions of The Legend of Zelda's theme playing to the footage. At most, only a second is used to show the game's name, the format it is for and the price, as everyone knows what format it is for if it has Link in it, and everyone knows the average price of a game, so that doens't need to be focused upon.
I have to admit that the Soul Calibur 2 advert is one of the best adverts for a videogame I've ever had the pleasure of viewing, even if it is only online. The fact is, it shows the game in all it's glory, it makes it out to be very exciting, and doesn't lead you into any false sense of anything else. Plus, with so much footage shown, it stays in the mind more! That's how adverts should be.
Is the reason us western types get the rubbishy adverts with very little game footage because the developers are afraid? Do they fear that we, the consumers, will think worse of the games if we see them in action? After all, I don't think 'The Third Place' adverts with a talking humanoid duck would really make me want a Playstation 2. (Note: It wasn't the advertising campaign that sold the PS2) The main thing taht put me off even thinking of getting the PS2 was the fact that most of the release games weren't even worth bothering with, or so the many forms of media kept telling me. If the games are good, they're worth showing off. Show off the good games, and they will sell well.
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Advertising sells games. That's a fact. Make a game look amazing, cool, and show it off in a way that will win the majority vote, and like a far-eastern country and the release of a new console, people will literally queue up all night outside their local outlets to be one of the first people to play the game!
Some companies don't even need to bother advertising, but they still go ahead and do it, and they'll reach that many more sales and reap the benefits, such as Sony and their extensive advertising campaign for the Playstation 2 around it's release. Microsoft made an impact with one of their adverts for the Xbox despite sales being low. It still got people talking, and even got the advert banned, which in turn shows a 'mature' image that gamers seem to love.
Nintendo, however, seem to be half-hearted with advertising. It is almost as if they feel that if a game is worth buying, it doesn't need advertising. Obviously, they advertise their games enough to get the word out by way of magazine adverts and showing bits of their games on their websites, but it is the television audience that get the most notice.
Nintendo initially set off to a good start. Adverts appeared nearly all the time on the main channels advertising all Nintendo's own launch titles, and the occasional third party title, whilst advertising the actual GameCube at the same time, however, lately Nintendo seem to advertise on the odd occasion on the lesser popular channels, most probably because the costs of advertising are cheaper.
But that's not what I want to get into a dispute about. What I have noticed, as a trend that is appearing in most television videogame adverts, is that the adverts focus more on an image, than the game itself. For example, the main Playstation 2 advert hardly showed anything about the Playstation 2 at all, mainly focusing on some random special effects that the console could never produce anyway, much alike the Xbox advert with the fast aging person who's born and dies within a matter of seconds. Even Nintendo's adverts seemed to focus more on special effects than the games themselves, but showed more ingame footage than the other two system's adverts.
There are some third party companies that seem to have the right idea about advertising though. But only some. One example appears to be the Rayman 3 advert for the Nintendo GameCube. Although only focusing on the GameCube version, the majority of the advert shows the game itself, and not some stupid real life acting. The Grand Theft Auto Vice City advert also stodd out as one of the better, even though I don't really like the game, as it showed ingame footage, and played music from the game. It showed you enough of what the game involved to make you want to see more, without showing too little of the game which could be missed if you blink...
...which leads me to the not so good adverts. One for example is The Getaway's advert. The majority of it involves some guy walking along a corridor with a phone ringing. It shows the odd half second of game footage, then it goes back to the man walking down the corridor, phone still ringing, and eventually he picks up the phone. As he does so, about two seconds of game footage is shown before the end of the advert. It has to be said that even if the game is good, the advert is pretty pathetic. It made me think, "Wow...a phone is ringing...and a bloke answers it...where's the fun in that?"
It's the adverts that get you thinking about the game that get people to buy the game. Although partially going against my argument, Nintendo made a pretty good advertising campaign for Super Mario Land 3: Wario Land on the original GameBoy years ago. When the advert was shown on TV, it was a time where nearly everyone was addicted to Super Mario World on the Super Nintendo, and so Nintendo didn't need to show ingame footage. It basically showed us Wario, Nitnendo's then brand new villian, boasting about how he is so much better than Mario, and so, because people had it in their heads that they were going to be playing a game even better than Super Mario World, people rushed out to buy it!
Going back to what I was saying earlier, if companies actually showed off their games in adverts, people would subconciously be imagining playing them, and so would want to give them a proper try. In Japan, this actually does happen, and as we all know, with the exception of a certain American console company whom the Japanese still aren't too sure about, games and consoles seem to sell a heck of a lot more there! That is because the Japanese are programmed to crave technology. Why? Because technology is shoved down their throats (metaphorically I must add) every second of the day! But not only technology, but games. The adverts in Japan are so much better than those shown in the UK!
There was one advert in Japan that was similar in style to that of the bonus demo disc Nintendo released for PC usage in late March 2002. It starts off showing the console in the middle of the screen, a hand grabs the handle very quickly with 'boing thwoop' sound effect playing, and some American dude says "Game-a-Cube". Then a load of videogame footage is shown for many games! Those who still have the disc Nintendo released in the UK might remember the Crazy Taxi, Extreme G and Tony Hawk's 3 footage for example, well Japan, a little more recently, but still quite a while back, were shown early footage of games still in development, like Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles for example. This is showing the Japanese gamers what they want to see. Quality games in development and due for release on a brilliant system.
What is even better for advertising is showing lots of fast paced action footage ripped straight from the game in question, with very little time being shown for anything else. Thanks to er-no pointing me to a website containing an advert like this, I was able to see the GameCube version of Soul Calibur 2 how it is advertised on Japanese TV. The advert shows one of Nintendo's most popular games characters, Link (although more slitty-eyed than I can remember), in various poses before he rapidly slices and dices most other characters featured in Soul Calibur 2 at very high speeds with his Master Sword. Meanwhile, in this thirty second advert, there's a Japanese voice-over sounding orgasmicly excited as he says whatever he's saying, as well as one of the better versions of The Legend of Zelda's theme playing to the footage. At most, only a second is used to show the game's name, the format it is for and the price, as everyone knows what format it is for if it has Link in it, and everyone knows the average price of a game, so that doens't need to be focused upon.
I have to admit that the Soul Calibur 2 advert is one of the best adverts for a videogame I've ever had the pleasure of viewing, even if it is only online. The fact is, it shows the game in all it's glory, it makes it out to be very exciting, and doesn't lead you into any false sense of anything else. Plus, with so much footage shown, it stays in the mind more! That's how adverts should be.
Is the reason us western types get the rubbishy adverts with very little game footage because the developers are afraid? Do they fear that we, the consumers, will think worse of the games if we see them in action? After all, I don't think 'The Third Place' adverts with a talking humanoid duck would really make me want a Playstation 2. (Note: It wasn't the advertising campaign that sold the PS2) The main thing taht put me off even thinking of getting the PS2 was the fact that most of the release games weren't even worth bothering with, or so the many forms of media kept telling me. If the games are good, they're worth showing off. Show off the good games, and they will sell well.
Some companies don't even need to bother advertising, but they still go ahead and do it, and they'll reach that many more sales and reap the benefits, such as Sony and their extensive advertising campaign for the Playstation 2 around it's release. Microsoft made an impact with one of their adverts for the Xbox despite sales being low. It still got people talking, and even got the advert banned, which in turn shows a 'mature' image that gamers seem to love.
Nintendo, however, seem to be half-hearted with advertising. It is almost as if they feel that if a game is worth buying, it doesn't need advertising. Obviously, they advertise their games enough to get the word out by way of magazine adverts and showing bits of their games on their websites, but it is the television audience that get the most notice.
Nintendo initially set off to a good start. Adverts appeared nearly all the time on the main channels advertising all Nintendo's own launch titles, and the occasional third party title, whilst advertising the actual GameCube at the same time, however, lately Nintendo seem to advertise on the odd occasion on the lesser popular channels, most probably because the costs of advertising are cheaper.
But that's not what I want to get into a dispute about. What I have noticed, as a trend that is appearing in most television videogame adverts, is that the adverts focus more on an image, than the game itself. For example, the main Playstation 2 advert hardly showed anything about the Playstation 2 at all, mainly focusing on some random special effects that the console could never produce anyway, much alike the Xbox advert with the fast aging person who's born and dies within a matter of seconds. Even Nintendo's adverts seemed to focus more on special effects than the games themselves, but showed more ingame footage than the other two system's adverts.
There are some third party companies that seem to have the right idea about advertising though. But only some. One example appears to be the Rayman 3 advert for the Nintendo GameCube. Although only focusing on the GameCube version, the majority of the advert shows the game itself, and not some stupid real life acting. The Grand Theft Auto Vice City advert also stodd out as one of the better, even though I don't really like the game, as it showed ingame footage, and played music from the game. It showed you enough of what the game involved to make you want to see more, without showing too little of the game which could be missed if you blink...
...which leads me to the not so good adverts. One for example is The Getaway's advert. The majority of it involves some guy walking along a corridor with a phone ringing. It shows the odd half second of game footage, then it goes back to the man walking down the corridor, phone still ringing, and eventually he picks up the phone. As he does so, about two seconds of game footage is shown before the end of the advert. It has to be said that even if the game is good, the advert is pretty pathetic. It made me think, "Wow...a phone is ringing...and a bloke answers it...where's the fun in that?"
It's the adverts that get you thinking about the game that get people to buy the game. Although partially going against my argument, Nintendo made a pretty good advertising campaign for Super Mario Land 3: Wario Land on the original GameBoy years ago. When the advert was shown on TV, it was a time where nearly everyone was addicted to Super Mario World on the Super Nintendo, and so Nintendo didn't need to show ingame footage. It basically showed us Wario, Nitnendo's then brand new villian, boasting about how he is so much better than Mario, and so, because people had it in their heads that they were going to be playing a game even better than Super Mario World, people rushed out to buy it!
Going back to what I was saying earlier, if companies actually showed off their games in adverts, people would subconciously be imagining playing them, and so would want to give them a proper try. In Japan, this actually does happen, and as we all know, with the exception of a certain American console company whom the Japanese still aren't too sure about, games and consoles seem to sell a heck of a lot more there! That is because the Japanese are programmed to crave technology. Why? Because technology is shoved down their throats (metaphorically I must add) every second of the day! But not only technology, but games. The adverts in Japan are so much better than those shown in the UK!
There was one advert in Japan that was similar in style to that of the bonus demo disc Nintendo released for PC usage in late March 2002. It starts off showing the console in the middle of the screen, a hand grabs the handle very quickly with 'boing thwoop' sound effect playing, and some American dude says "Game-a-Cube". Then a load of videogame footage is shown for many games! Those who still have the disc Nintendo released in the UK might remember the Crazy Taxi, Extreme G and Tony Hawk's 3 footage for example, well Japan, a little more recently, but still quite a while back, were shown early footage of games still in development, like Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles for example. This is showing the Japanese gamers what they want to see. Quality games in development and due for release on a brilliant system.
What is even better for advertising is showing lots of fast paced action footage ripped straight from the game in question, with very little time being shown for anything else. Thanks to er-no pointing me to a website containing an advert like this, I was able to see the GameCube version of Soul Calibur 2 how it is advertised on Japanese TV. The advert shows one of Nintendo's most popular games characters, Link (although more slitty-eyed than I can remember), in various poses before he rapidly slices and dices most other characters featured in Soul Calibur 2 at very high speeds with his Master Sword. Meanwhile, in this thirty second advert, there's a Japanese voice-over sounding orgasmicly excited as he says whatever he's saying, as well as one of the better versions of The Legend of Zelda's theme playing to the footage. At most, only a second is used to show the game's name, the format it is for and the price, as everyone knows what format it is for if it has Link in it, and everyone knows the average price of a game, so that doens't need to be focused upon.
I have to admit that the Soul Calibur 2 advert is one of the best adverts for a videogame I've ever had the pleasure of viewing, even if it is only online. The fact is, it shows the game in all it's glory, it makes it out to be very exciting, and doesn't lead you into any false sense of anything else. Plus, with so much footage shown, it stays in the mind more! That's how adverts should be.
Is the reason us western types get the rubbishy adverts with very little game footage because the developers are afraid? Do they fear that we, the consumers, will think worse of the games if we see them in action? After all, I don't think 'The Third Place' adverts with a talking humanoid duck would really make me want a Playstation 2. (Note: It wasn't the advertising campaign that sold the PS2) The main thing taht put me off even thinking of getting the PS2 was the fact that most of the release games weren't even worth bothering with, or so the many forms of media kept telling me. If the games are good, they're worth showing off. Show off the good games, and they will sell well.