Hellgate Beta's In-Game Ads Raise Eyebrows

ari wins writes "IGN.com has up a post discussing the new EA/Flagship game Hellgate: London, and the in-game advertisements it includes to facilitate targeted marketing. Though ads in games aren't exactly new, some Beta testers are objecting to their apparently off-putting presence. Users have also noted that accepting the game's EULA means you submit to the collection of 'technical and related information that identifies your computer, including without limitation your Internet Protocol address, operating system, application software and peripheral hardware'."

I'm playing

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm playing it. Hellgate is Diablo II on steroids (it was designed by the creators of Diablo). Great game.

NVIDIA is indeed big. Dark Horse comics as well.

TO BE CLEAR: there are no, "now we pause for this word from our sponsor" moments and big baddy doesn't come after you wearing an NVIDIA t-shirt. The only thing I've spotted is NVIDIA and Dark Horse posters in the Underground Stations (it's London) and in the city ruins- kinda like the fake posters and magazines in DOOM 3, but real companies.

If it provides a revenue stream that would otherwise increase the price of the game I have no problem with this.

Re:wtf

[SeekerDarksteel]

1) Your character is not gimped. You don't get certain online only options like shared stashes, guild creation, or the same number of character slots.

2) Not subscribing does absolutely nothing to the single player. A single player game that is good enough on its own to justify the cost of the box. In addition you get free online play even if you never play another dime. I seriously think that if they offered NO free online play, instead saying you can play single player on your own or pay a subscription for online, that there would be less people pissed off.

3) The subscription replaces having to buy expansions every six months or a year. Look at WoW. $15 a month, plus $50 a year for an expansion, plus no single player. And you don't hear anyone bitching about that.

4) You clearly haven't seen the ads. They are far from invasive. You can play through and never even notice that the ads on the subway walls are for real products. They aren't bright neon signs that scream "BUY COKE, MMM COKE." They're dirty worn down subway ads you'd expect to see in a subway. Only they're for actual products. I don't like the precedence either, but it's definitely not a gamebreaker.

Re:Your IP address is being broadcast RIGHT NOW!

[j79zlr]

Mining your IP address and OS version is nothing special, but TFS says that it also transmits information about your installed programs and connected hardware. That is a little more invasive than the info included in your headers.

Re:This CAN be stopped

[arivanov]

In countries that do not have suitable retail legislation (UK) you should buy via mail order or over the Internet. That gives you a 14 days by law to decide if you want to shovel the item back up the retailer's backside. Similar laws apply in most of the EU as a part of the distance selling regulations.

Re:This CAN be stopped

[KDR_11k]

The EULA is between you and the publisher, not you and the store. If the store says "we don't take returns" then the EULA can't do jack shit about it. You could try getting the publisher to refund you or you could contest the EULA in court somehow because you weren't presented the contract before purchase and won't get your money back once you read the contract. Not sure that'd work though.

Re:Spying

[illumin8]

I do mind giving EA and Flagship blanket permission to examine everything on my computer. READ what their "agreement" says -- they can mine your computer for whatever data they want, and give/sell it to whomever pays for it.

This is such a non-story, it isn't even funny. Talk about blowing things out of proportion. Their agreement gives them the right to do less than Google has the right to do every time you make a search. What's more, they even promise not to use your individual data in any way. It is only used in aggregate form, pretty much like Google. Check this text, from the very agreement (emphasis mine):

EA and/or the Related Parties may also use this information in the aggregate and, in a form which does not personally identify you, to improve our products and services and we may share that aggregate data with our third party service providers.

I've been playing the beta the last 2 weeks, and I must tell you, this game pretty much rocks. It's like Diablo 2 met Halflife 2 and they had a baby. A demon spawned, zombie killing, FPS if you want to or hack-n-slash or pew-pew with spells if you want to, clickfest of a game. This game is like Diablo 2 in full 3d on crack. It is about as addictive as crack, and you're going to be hearing a lot about it over the next couple weeks.

Re:Unobtrusive

[illumin8]

I'm in the beta, and the NDA just lifted yesterday, so here are some screenshots. The ads are very unobtrusive. The game takes place in London, 2038, after hellgates have opened and demons have killed 99% of the people on the earth. So, having posters appear on the walls of dirty, blasted out subway tunnel walls fits in very well with the theme of the game. The posters are so dingy you can barely read them unless you look close, and it matches the post-apocalyptic feel of the game to see ads from the "past." Judge for yourself:

Screenshot 1 [iswiki.com]
Screenshot 2 [iswiki.com]
Screenshot 3 [iswiki.com]

As far as the gameplay goes? This game totally rocks! Imagine if Diablo and Half-Life 2 had a baby. A demon and zombie infested, mutant loot pinata of a baby... Basically, you can hack and slash if you want to, pew-pew with spells if you want to, or shoot guns like an FPS if you want to. It's Diablo in full 3d, by Bill Roper and most of the guys from Blizzard North that created Diablo 1 and 2. There is single player and online multi-player. The online multi-player is instanced like Guild Wars, where only the towns are public. It's one hell of a lot of fun, and completely addictive, just like the original Diablos were. Imagine Diablo with full 3d, a physics engine, and exploding barrels ala HL2.

I think you're going to be hearing a lot of good things about this game.

Re:Unobtrusive

[Hemogoblin]

Maybe it's my monitor, but those screenshots are so dark I can't even see the ads if I squint and look real hard. I even closed the blinds and I still can't see them.

Re:hellgate beta

[Anonymous Coward]

The ads are streamed by Massive, a Microsoft advertising company.

They are easy to block, as Massive is used to stream the ads that are shown to free players in Anarchy Online. I added the Massive servers/ip addresses to Peerguardian 2 in order to block them. Play the free version of AO all the time with not one commercial/advertisement. In fact, here ya go:

madserver.net:38.119.38.151
ad.madserver.net:38.119.38.151
imp.madserver.net:38.119.38.153
media.madserver.net:38.119.38.152

Block those, and AO is ad free. The same can be done for any EA game or any game using Massive for their advertisements.

Blocking ingame advertising

[Cecil]

For anyone who's interested in blocking ingame advertising, I'm sure it will end up being a rapidly changing arms race as usual, but for the moment, blocking the following IP ranges is sufficient to kill updated advertising and privacy-invading "impressions" tracking from both of the major ad providers (IGA Worldwide and Massive Inc)

38.119.38.0/24 (Massive Inc)
65.55.179.0/24 (Massive Inc)
72.3.184.144/28 (IGA)
72.32.5.0/28 (IGA)

Massive does lookups on the domain madserver.net (imp.madserver.net, media.madserver.net, z.madserver.net, etc ad nauseum) to get its IP addresses, whereas IGA seems to use hardcoded IPs (there is no reverse-lookup for them either, although they are hosted by rackspace)

The massive blocks are enough to block advertising and impressions data for Enemy Territory: Quake Wars as well as SWAT4 and does not seem to have any effect on gameplay. They have been confirmed with tcpdump. The only other network activity (besides multiplayer) are simply checking for updates and registering with the master multiplayer servers at
demonware.net.

I am not so sure about the IGA blocks, that's mostly just information from forum posts, since I don't have Battlefield 2142 there's not much I can do to test it. Your milage may vary.

Re:This CAN be stopped

[Domstersch]

Rubbish. That's store policy that has nothing to do with copyright law. Really. Go read the Copyright Act [legislation.govt.nz].

Your rights are protected under the Consumer Guarantees Act 1993, meaning you are entitled to a refund, replacement or repair if the product is defective, not fit for the intended purpose, or not in merchantable condition. It doesn't have to be a physical problem with the disk, it doesn't matter if you've used the product, and it doesn't matter if the store has a policy saying otherwise (your right to a remedy is inalienable). Copyright just doesn't enter into the equation, despite those signs you see around the place.

It's a shame more New Zealanders aren't aware of their rights under the CGA; it's one of the best pieces of legislation we have.

Re:I'm playing

[Gideon Fubar]

I'm also in the beta. The ads are in a lot of places in the town areas.. plastered would probably be an accurate way of describing it.. they're not, however, intrusive. In fact, despite the fact that they're everywhere, i found myself actually looking at them the other day trying to work out what the hell they were for.. They fit the art style quite well, they're dirty, deliberately pretty hard to see and even harder to read..

If it wasn't for the fact that the EULA seems to say that they can survey whatever system i run it on and collect the results (and if it didn't have bad memory leaks) i'd have no problem with this game at all.

Really, it's a pretty fun game too, assuming your favorite part of diablo wasn't the clicking...

I'm a beta player

[MMaestro]

I'm in the Hellgate beta and the NDA clause was really strict with the official forums being for beta testers only, no screenshots or in game videos allowed, and the general catch-all "you cannot talk about in game content" phrases. I say 'was' because the NDS was lifted just last Friday.

That said, there ARE ads in the game, but contrary to popular belief, the ads DO NOT appear after you leave the stations (read: towns). Unlike the Battlefield 2 ads, which were over sized and overly bright in many cases, the ads in Hellgate look like they've been covered in several layers of dirt from sheer disrepair. The ads in Hellgate are roughly the same size as a standard promotional movie poster and not obvious at all. Its not unheard of to find a beta player who simply never noticed them either because their graphics are turned down or because they don't spend much time in town, no thanks to the sheer lack of lighting in some portions.

Re:wtf

[SeekerDarksteel]

Wow released an expansion in January. Guess when the next expansion is coming out. Early next 2008. They've also said that they plan on one a year or so from now on. They added a lot of content between release and BC. How much have they added since BC came out? One 40 man instance that was supposed to be out at the same time as the xpac itself that less than 2% of the WoW population will ever even see.

So in conclusion, ditch the attitude if you can't even get your own fucking facts straight.

(Oh, and btw, phase and toxic grenades no longer bounce. One sticks to walls and the other explodes on contact. So not only is your entire complaint of gameplay on one skill, it's one they're tweaking because ...SURPRISE SURPRISE ITS BETA)

Re:This CAN be stopped

[vuffi_raa]

not necessarily- unless the vendor can verify that the game is no longer installed and/or registered, the game, for all intensive purposes is pirated on it's next install (unless it is like the old warcraft and starcraft that came with multiple machine licenses per purchase).
yes it is stupid, but that is the way it works