Deus Ex Alpha

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We’ve been closely watching the debate that’s been going on over the inclusion of advertising in Deus Ex. It’s clear there are strong views, but primarily lots of people have been asking for more information on the issue – so hopefully that’s something I can help with.

We’re aware that this is an emotive topic and so this is something we’ve been very, very careful about implementing – because what we absolutely don’t want to do is break immersion with the game itself.

In-game advertising is one of the revenue streams which games companies can use to supplement game sales and revenues generated in this way can genuinely help with the cost of development.

To explain a little about how the process works: As part of the deal we have with our advertising partner, we’re able to reject any ads which we don’t feel are of interest for the game or its player base. In fact, that’s why they’ve only started appearing recently – because we rejected everything else up until the recent ad on the loading screen. The timing there was purely coincidental with the release of a PC patch, by the way.

As to how we deal with ads in the future, we’ve noted the passion that some people feel about the issue, and that better up-front communication would be appreciated.

Full disclosure: We have just approved a new advert which will appear in the loading screen of the game soon. We haven’t cleared anything to run on the in-game billboards as yet (that functionality does exist in the game). Ads will appear in Deus Ex in the future and our aim is to try to keep them as relevant as possible.

For other future games we’ll definitely bear in mind all of your comments on this topic – but meanwhile please keep telling us your thoughts on what we do.

Originally Posted by Ashpolt View Post
You've done the taking, now what are you giving in return?

This is one of the really useful questions that we've noted, although I can't predict at this point how that feedback might be used, and - honestly - it's not likely to be possible to give any answer in relation to Deus Ex: Human Revolution.

But for future reference, it's interesting to try and understand where the line is (while acknowledging that it's probably slightly different for everybody).

What (realistically) would you look for in return? How would you judge what is fair value in relation to the number or regularity of ads? At what point do ads break immersion with the game - loading screens or in-game billboards, or both? How important is it that information about ads is released in advance of the ability to buy (or pre-order) the game? And so on.

The more constructive feedback we can get on those kinds of issues, the better.