Those Damn Mobile Ads
Dear mobile game ads, I really dislike most of you, and I wish there was a way to make you pay for the stress and frustration you cause. Now I know there are many gamers out there that have those exact feelings, and we probably have differing reasons, or perhaps we share exactly the same feelings. Here’s the deal for me…
I am very aware that if you are going to pick up a free-to-play game you’re going to have to deal with ads. There are ads that will appear between “levels”, there are ads that appear when you need help in a “level”, and there are also ads that are available for you to watch to get some sort of bonus in the game. I want to be clear, I have no qualms with those facts, hell I have no qualms with the developers of the games I’m playing. It’s the ads themselves that drive me nuts. I know that every developer that has an ad running is having to pay to get eyes on their game, and I don’t have a problem with that either. It really boils down to the tricky tactics that take place in the ads.
There are ads where you get to interact with a game mechanic, which I enjoy, however chances are that I’m going to complete the “playable” section within the time limit and then I’m going to have to stare at the countdown until I can exit the ad. There is another version of the interactable ads, and those are the ones that once the counter ticks to zero you go to another screen that has an additional counter. So in essence the developer has trapped you with 2 ads for their game in what should be a 1 ad slot.
Then you have the ads that fake you out. They have some sort of indicator that makes you believe that there’s an interactive component to the ad, but in fact it simply takes you to the game page in the app store. Now if you’re like me you might try one more time to see if maybe you tapped on the wrong part of the ad, and that there’s only a section that is interactive. This will bring you back to the same game page because you know in the back of your mind you’re going to get the same result, even though you hope you won’t. Unfortunately there are those ads out there that slam you with the 2 ads in the 1 ad slot, and these will drive you nuts.
There are also ads that are trailers for the games, showing just the best parts, popping up text from time to time to hint at the awesomeness of the game, and of course trying to glitz and glam you into getting the game. Honestly, these are probably the ads that I tune out the most. I’m not going to say I haven’t ever tapped on one to find out more info, or perhaps give the game a try, but for the most part I tend to glance at the screen, from time to time, to see if the video is over so that I can return to the game I’m currently playing.
There is the “Holy Grail” of ads, and I think it is safe to say that any gamer drools over these when they occur. I’m talking, of course, of the ads that simply pop up and give you the option to check it out or close the ad. Oddly enough, these ads can be about anything and everything. It might end up being an ad for some sort of food, financial institute, productivity app, or in VERY rare cases another game. If there was a way to filter those types of ads to appear more than the other types, that would make for some really happy gamers, and of course some really pissed developers.
I’ve left the last type of ad that I want to talk about till the end. These I like to call misdirection or misleading ads. These are the ads that I truly wish the developers would get into legal trouble for false advertising. I know that companies have been taken to court SEVERAL times when they mislead the consumer on what their product can or can’t do. Yet developers can get away with this. It’s very agitating that because of these ads we are now having to second guess every ad that appears. “Is this what the game really is, or is this yet another example of us being misled?” Sure, there are some ads out there that at least show off some sort of a mechanic that is in their game, but not implemented in the way that is shown to you in the ad. The best example I can give is some of those puzzle matching games where you are seeing a fast paced action game where the matches are relatively simple but require you to think quickly. When you download the game you quickly discover that it’s more of a match-3 game where you might get to attack monsters, or maybe complete the mission, in a certain number of moves. There’s also a very good chance that the game graphics might also be slightly different from the ad.
Once again I want to reiterate that I have no issues with having ads in games, especially in free-to-play games, but can we PLEASE have ads that don’t mislead the consumer? If you want to have an interactive component, that’s cool. Do you want to just show off a trailer, that’s cool as well. If you want to go the short ad route, I thank you from the bottom of my heart. Just PLEASE do away with the ads that aren’t what they appear to be. Oh there’s also you bastards out there that have decided to add a close out ‘X’ on the ad whose only function turns out to be taking you to the game info page inside of the app store. I’m sure there are some people out there that will fall for those tricks and say, "Well what the hell, why not?” but most of us gamers/consumers just get really pissed.