Nivea and Sam Fisher want you to shave that beard!
by Nick Doerr 
{ Oct 19th 2006 at 5:30PM }
Nivea has snuck its way into Sam Fisher's heart. The two have teamed up to bring you in-game advertisements! What better way to escape your everyday dreary and tedious world than to get pelted with ads for real companies while breaking someone's neck in a bathroom? Ubisoft's Splinter Cell: Double Agent will offer a fine array of Nivea and Philips Norelco products set along bathroom sinks in hotel rooms. There are also billboards specifically designed to talk to you, the gamer, not you, the Sam Fisher, saying such game-related teasings as "The 'Good Guy' almost never has a beard," and "There are many faces of evil. Don't let yours be one of them."If you want your ads to be subtle, use real ads. Ads in the real world. Don't make ads that are trying to talk about the game that's being played. That's like a movie stopping suddenly and listening for the audience to laugh, or if something unrealistic happens in a movie, a character cleverly snaps out the one-liner "Only in the movies!" Please. Game advertisements may be lucrative, but they're still lame. As much as the phrase itself irks us, we're tempted to say "sell-out", but it's becoming all too common in the "Realistic Gaming" world. Sam Fisher... you can be pretty stealthy, but you're not too good at dodging corporate advertisement offers. Hmm... it sounded a tad bit better in my mind.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Adam @ Oct 19th 2006 5:36PM
Double Agent isn't coming to PS3.
chillski @ Oct 19th 2006 8:07PM
lol, yep defintely not a ps3 game. wish it was but its not. too bad cause it would be about 100 times more kick ass if it were to come out on the ps3
ozymandias @ Oct 19th 2006 8:42PM
its not that bad. im playing double agent now and have only seen an electric razor in a cruse ship bathroom, and a norelo ad on the tv. it actually fits right in and I probably wouldnt have noticed it if i didnt read about it on joystiq.
ndoerr @ Oct 19th 2006 9:24PM
Hey guys -- I know this game isn't coming to the PS3! Never said it was, but it's a good general statement as to the way realistic games are going regarding ads. It would be neat, however, in games like Resistance to have ads in it, but dated ads (think of a 1940's Coca Cola advertisement spattered with blood). This kind of placement just makes me angry. Go ahead and think up some of the craziest ads possible -- I like my example, personally =)
Tom @ Oct 20th 2006 4:31AM
Nick Doerr, I'm getting tired of your anti-Gillette bias! It is, after all, The Best a Man Can Get™
chillski @ Oct 20th 2006 8:32AM
lmao, i dont find it upsetting yet but it worries me that they are gonna get too carried away. like start having advertisments for loading screens/in game commericials, u know once they start getting those big fat paychecks in its gonna get more and more tempting in the future.
Johnny @ Nov 17th 2006 3:24PM
The website that the ads in the game promote, theGoodSide.com, is pretty crazy. If you click the red X it takes you to this Splinter Cell/NSA thing. I dont know if some dude hacked it or what, but if you click that little red logo thing on the bottom an ascII comes up that looks like hacker art.