2.10 advert discussion, NOT a lawsuit thread.

[Lance]

For those who still want to vent about this subject. If you want to sue Sony, go outside the WZ to do it.

[mdhay]

Bllllllllllllllllllllllllaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrr rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrgggggggggggggggggg ggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhSonyhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh .

*phss*
I'm done with venting for about three hours. :):g

[Lance]

Well done!

[Golgofier]

Do people get sound with the adverts? I don't (not that I'm complaining, just curious). Sorry for slight OT.

[SaturnReturn]

Indeed people do. That's part of what irritates a lot of people I think - the fact that they can be quite loud. I think maybe the newer ones are quieter, or possibly different ads just have different volume levels.

[Golgofier]

Oh, well that's odd since I only see the ads, no audio. Maybe regional differences then, or we'll chalk it up as another bug (be it an agreeable one :)

[Lance]

VEry agreeable; you're lucky. :+

[JaLK]

I find it quite unfair that only some regions of the world gets ads and some don't. I mean come on. It's not like the American(generally speaking) deserve to get adds and we don't.

If you're going to put ads in your game then make it for everyone at the very least.

[Vartazian]

Yo SL Ignore what JaLk Said hes from Quebec!

The Bloc De Quebecquois Dont even know what they want. so SHHHH

[il_mago_di_Doz]

I just wanted to say ...

The whole world in your hands :blarg

[Effedieffe]

.... I only see the ads, no audio....
I too but I play without music, only race effects :D

[DrMannevond]

I just wanted to say ...

The whole world in your hands :blarg

More like 'our whole hand in your pocket'.
@Golgofier : I don't have sound on the ads either (thank god!), so it's probably a regional thing.

[Connavar]

Maybe only some languages are supported in ads, which could explain why
some countries get no audio, (and I chose "Dutch" as my official language
instead of French, maybe it's not supported yet?).

[yeldar2097]

I wonder if I'd still get ads if I made a PSN account in some rel-end country...
Gonna try that soon, just to check :)

[Koleax]

ProblemSolver said in the other thread that it filters by IP addresses. The game contacts a separate ad server and ostensibly ignores the region on your PSN ID. It'd be interesting to hear your results, though!

[Golgofier]

@DrM: haha, yeah that's for damn sure :P

If it is regional (which it would appear to be) I'm sure it's filtering by IP, anything else would be pretty unorthodox.

[JaLK]

Yo SL Ignore what JaLk Said hes from Quebec!

The Bloc De Quebecquois Dont even know what they want. so SHHHH

What does me living in Quebec have anything to do with I want and do not want?

[SaturnReturn]

It says in the title, "NOT a lawsuit thread". So if there are any intra-national issues between fellow Canadians then please settle them out of court (court=this thread). :P
Thanks.

[JaLK]

You got it Saturn. I did not intend to create hostility. I am sorry.

[Seraphim1982]

I don't get why everyone hates the adverts so much. I mean at best it only takes a few extra seconds to load the race you are playing and it increases revenue to SL so we can get more/cheaper DLC in the future.

[Lance]

Every wasted second is removed from your life, and life is short.

[ACE-FLO]

I don't get why everyone hates the adverts so much. I mean at best it only takes a few extra seconds to load the race...

we're a bloody hard bunch to please, but i agree - a few seconds, no biggie, time enough to drag on a scooby and sip ribena, by the time you've exhaled, your thrusters would have warmed up!

[IH8YOU]

Have a look...

The Average American watches an incredible 4.35hrs. oh T.V. a day!
An hour show is really a 44 minute show without commercials,
so that's 16 minutes of commercials an hour times 4.35 equals 69.6,
69.6 minutes a day times 365 days per year equals 25,404 minutes yearly, divide by 60 for hours that's 423, then divide by 24 for days and ya got 17.64 days a year. Of Non. Stop. Ads.

Now multiply by 20 years and that's almost a full year of, yup commercials.

Shall we get started in internet-based ads, or radio, or newspapers, billboards, and now our video games...

Just a couple of seconds to spare? :mad: I want them back.

[Lance]

Television commercials, I mostly don't watch. Commercial tv has very little of interest to me, so I watch what does, the occasional movie on DVD, for instance, but mostly I watch PBS and college stations that also broadcast some PBS content. For commercial tv, my computer is always on; during commercials, I'm doing something else for the five minutes the commercials run. But commercial breaks that last less than a minute would be pure frustration, not enough time to really concentrate on some pleasant 'task'.

[okam]

Hmm, I'm in Norway and I do get audio in the ads. Wonder why the swedish and other norwegian poster don't get audio on theirs?

[Koleax]

The adverts don't waste my time as much as they damage my dignity. I'm not a cheap person and I don't lack so much maturity to be interested in Fat Princess this much.

It's all Fat Princess all the time now. No more PixelJunk Monsters ad, which was also cheap and annoying, but now there is even less variation. By sticking mostly to Speed Lap and Zone mode, I narrowed the number of times I had to watch the Fat Princess ad to about 6 times an hour yesterday.

The real victim is Wipeout. Can this truly be lost on them? I am a customer who's interested in Wipeout, which compared to Fat Princess is a luxurious work of art in good taste. If I am still playing Wipeout, after the 100th Fat Princess ad, do they really want to show me another Fat Princess ad?

There's a way to put advertising in Wipeout with dignity and respect. They should at least take my money to remove the ads. Instead they've made the game a whore.

[SaturnReturn]

Indeed the repetitive nature of the adverts is starting to wear very thin. Last night I think I had one GT ad and one Motorstorm ad. After that it was Rocky all night, without fail. I really want WipEout as a franchise to continues and therefore revenue is important. But this way of doing things will only put people off and WipEout will lose out. :(

[DrMannevond]

Hmm, I'm in Norway and I do get audio in the ads. Wonder why the swedish and other norwegian poster don't get audio on theirs?

Well, I live way out in the middle of nowhere (Indre Sogn, for those familiar with norwegian geography), so maybe Sony doen't think it's worth piping the sound all the way here?:D

[DISRUPTOR]

The introduction of unwanted adverts into a product we have already paid for without our consent is disgusting and unacceptable.
Mods closing threads and remaining neutral on this sore subject is also poor too from what I have seen imo.

[Lance]

I did not remain neutral, I've negatively criticised the adverts. The only threads I truly closed were a lawsuit thread, and a redundant troll thread, that would have just repeated the same things we already had a thread for. You guys have no right to attempt to start a lawsuit against Sony and base it here in a forum owned by a private individual who might have to suffer for your actions by being held legally responsible for them. Did anyone of you even bother to ask him if it was okay?

I also closed the old 2.10 thread to give advert discussion its own thread because it had swamped all other discussion of 2.10 effects, and I also started a new thread for just those effects. This was done to give full scope to discussion of all the issues rather than only adverts. There are now three threads for discussing the results of 2.10. Four if you count the one IH8YOU started, which asks if you've stopped playing HD/Fury since 2.10, or at least reduced your play of the game. So please do not accuse me or the other mods with vague charges of stuff which is not true.

[SaturnReturn]

I echo Lance's sentiments. No-one is trying to silence opinions. I for one just want them to be expressed and dealt with in the right place and the right way.

Coming from the point of view as an individual here, I don't like the way these adverts have been introduced. I appreciate that revenue is a necessity to keep the franchise alive, but if this is required then adverts should be in the game from the start and anyone who pays good money for it should be made well aware of their presence or likely presence. As I've stated before, I think their presence in the game will only harm the future of WipEout as people turn away from the game and become bitter and negative towards Studio Liverpool and Sony.

So what am I doing about it?

I have myself contacted Consumer Direct in the UK to inquire about the legality of this. I will post any feedback I get on the forum for everyone's information. If anyone wants to start a petition then I will happily sign it. I haven't currently had time to do this myself or to take any further actions. If people are to go down the route of legal action, as an individual who is in love with this franchise I will have to consider whether I feel it is of benefit or whether it will only harm the game's future.

[lunar]

You`re going about it the right way. It`s a consumer issue.


I don't get why everyone hates the adverts so much. I mean at best it only takes a few extra seconds to load the race you are playing and it increases revenue to SL so we can get more/cheaper DLC in the future.

But I have to ask how would we know any of the ad money is going to the customer`s benefit? We don`t and we never will. There is no objective person or organisation that could say whether the ads were doing any more than just increasing profits. I would rather leave things as they are: you get what you pay for. It`s worked for a long time. Sony/SL clearly don`t want to leave it this way, so how could we trust them to tell us if the adverts benefitted us in any way? Particularly given the Ministry of Truth style Orwellian prounouncements that we often seem to get direct from Sony and their advertising allies in their Death Star HQ ;):robot That was a joke, attempted anyway :paperbag

I think we need some form of action, but it needs to be proportionate. Legal action and talk of it is going way too far. This is just my hobby after all and if I`m going to fight a battle with my life there are better causes! I think some form of general circular letter that we could send to Sony and advertisers would be useful, to officially register our dismay at this move, using our real names. It needs to be simple and respectful. We would need to collate accurate information about whether ads continue to extend loading times and any other negative effects they have on gameplay. If loading times are still extended by ads then we have a very effective argument. It seems to be the case, but I don`t know for sure. We also have a good argument if it can be shown that 2.10 introduces new bugs on the back of adverts.

Speaking of bugs, I once got a refund for a Studio Liverpool game by arguing to Sony, succesfully, that it was not fit for sale. It was an F1 game, and after their pit stops the AI cars would drive at pit lane or at best cruising speed for the rest of the race - up to another 40 or 50 laps. It all meant the race was over after the first pit stops. I could only conclude the game had been released without anyone actually carrying out a full distance race to test it. This kind of bug makes an F1 game pointless, obviously. There was another F1 game of theirs which advertised online play on the box, but when you opened it and loaded it you realised they had cancelled the feature but still sold the game with advertising for it on the box, which surely increased sales! I can`t remember if I got a refund for that or not. I think I kept it because the rest of the game was okay.

The relevance of this tale is that I got my money back on the grounds that the game was mis-sold, or not fit for sale, in the first case. I think a similar argument could work with Wipeout HD. I think I could possibly argue that the game I have is not the game I was sold, though I`m not sure I can be bothered to have that argument and I do actually want to keep the game, after all. But I think this is another approach that could make Sony notice the issue. As a matter of fact, considering the adverts especially, I do think I have a case that I was mis-sold this game. I would still like an answer to all the terms and conditions questions about whether Sony have a right to do this, just so as a consumer I know what my rights are. I don`t think we are going fight let alone win any legal battles, but as consumers we can make our displeasure known very directly by contacting customer services, and with sensible arguments this could have success.

[infoxicated]

The introduction of unwanted adverts into a product we have already paid for without our consent is disgusting and unacceptable.
Mods closing threads and remaining neutral on this sore subject is also poor too from what I have seen imo.
What the mods are trying to do is control the bloodlust and the mob mentality - people are being very quick to light the torches, grab the pitch forks and shout their outrage.

Wouldn't it be better to focus the discussion on what can be done about the situation, rather than re-hashing the same negativity over and over?

And as for suggesting we're attempting to stay neutral on the subject - I've lost friends at Studio Liverpool because I've spoken out against the product on here, so get your facts straight before you say stuff like that.

There are plenty of anonymous internet warriors hiding behind a username on here. Conversely, it's no secret who I am and what my background is and I've gone on record many times when I think there's something wrong with the series.

I think the slapdash implemtation of the adverts has been a very bad decision and shows a complete disregard for the userbase - especially as an addition to a product that has already paid for.

Is that clear enough for you Disruptor? 'Cos I don't think that reads particularly neutral.

Myself, I hadn't even downloaded the 2.11 patch before I uninstalled the game on Friday night because I was upgrading my PS3 to a 500Gb hard drive and wanted to get the filesize down for the backup/restore. I've re-installed everything I deleted in the transition, but I have no intention of re-installing WipEout HD while it's showing me adverts.

Same as I have no intention of letting mob mentality rule the posting traffic here - it's a discussion forum. Either discuss things in a mature and sensible fashion or threads will be locked.

[Seraphim1982]

All I'm saying is the adverts don't bother me one bit. It's not like there is a storyline to the game that it is interrupting and I'm not having extra money taken out of my wallet. Yes it's taking up a tiny bit of my time but to be honest if I was that pressed for it I wouldn't be sitting there playing a game.

[Lance]

It's not just about time; it's also about being subjected to loud, childish, obnoxious crap repeatedly; it does not respect the people who support the game and the company that makes it; it destroys the integrity of the game; it is an offence against the sensibilities of anyone who appreciates the art and science of creative effort, and that, for me, is the most damning thing of all.

With the release of the PS3 Slim at an affordable price, Sony had pretty much convinced me to at least buy one for the gaming possibilities and potential as a Blu-Ray player, but this latest round of crapping on their customers, plus their seemingly neverending incompetence to run a good service, has convinced me not to support them in any way, and certainly not by spending my money on their products and services. I will not be joining any group effort to modify their behaviour in any way, but I take away with me what they once might have had. They will make no profit from me. If their eventual corporate ill-health or even complete cessation occurs, I will not regret their passing, because the Sony that once was the most innovative and finest of the mass hardware makers is already gone.

[Asayyeah]

Well said Lance :+

[SaturnReturn]

I remember last time this happened someone posted a direct comparison on youtube of the game load times with and without adverts. Has anyone done the same this time around?

[QjonPL]

Loading times are obviously longer with Ads, no need to do any comparisons ;) ^^

I noticed something different - Ads did not show a single time when I was playing Zone (offline), maybe that's because Zone stages are being loaded a lot faster than Racing ones.
So everyone, let's go in da Zone! :D

[Hail Seizure]

I do not own a PS3.
The only thing making me want to own a PS3 was Wipeout HD.
Ads make me not want to play Wipeout HD.
Therefore, until ads are no longer a feature of Wipeout HD, there is no conceivable reason for me to buy a PS3.

[lunar]

Loading times are not the main issue, but a video would still be great to have as evidence, given longer loading times was reported as a reason the first wave of adverts were dropped. I think ranting on here will achieve nothing more. The only way we`ll get anything done is to approach Sony directly as individual consumers, with our complaints and our facts straight. We need to figure out the best way to do this.

[Seraphim1982]

We are bombarded by advertising constantly though, it was only a matter of time before it started making a regular appearance in games. Wipeout is just the tip of the proverbial iceberg, it won't be long before there is product placement in other games too or even full blown adverts and so long as they make money they will continue to be used. I agree the adverts should be more appropriate though for the medium they are presented in but this is all very new and hopefully will improve as they get feedback and learn from their mistakes.

[SaturnReturn]

Indeed, and someone has to provide this feedback and be sure that the mistakes are highlighted appropriately, IMO. Because, as you say, it's only the tip of the iceberg, and it's not a pleasant iceberg to be faced with.

[IH8YOU]

Wow, I just realized how ironic my situation is... Or perhaps it's unfortunate?

Wipeout HD gets ads the first time around, I vow to stop playing entirely out of complete disgust. I look for another game - solely to play with the same friends who played Wipeout HD - but elsewhere.

I get Fat Princess - turns out, I don't like it at all, and at the same time, Sony temporarily removes ads from Wipeout. I cave in to my addiction...

So the ads are back once again, and I'm trying to tolerate them (for the record, I'm failing at it) - but the biggest slap to the face - what AD do I get over... and over.... and over... ......... Fat Princess. :brickwall

It appears that I really do suck at life.

[Koleax]

I've seen adverts before Zone. Maybe you were thinking of instances where offline you select "race again" and it loads the same track and same mode again in less than two seconds. I have not seen ads during those intervals.


it is an offence against the sensibilities of anyone who appreciates the art and science of creative effort, and that, for me, is the most damning thing of all.

Completely agreed.

What puzzles me more is that the Wipeout franchise is (was?) unique in its artistic purity. The clean lines, smooth surfaces, pristine colors, fresh electronica, and an unpolluted utopian future are not found together in any other game. One of the games was actually titled "Pure." Yet, this game was singled out among other Sony properties for such a brazen act.

I'd rather they slapped me. Really. Then I could shake it off and go play the game.

Playing Wipeout HD used to help me shake off a lot of things. I considered playing it good for my soul, in the same category as walking down the lakefront or through a museum, not in the same category as watching commercial television or anything ad-supported.

Some senior people at Studio Liverpool thought that it was not only worth contaminating this beauty, but baiting customers in order to do so. I've called them "Fat Princesses" after a particular ad they ask me to watch. I'm American and consider that a harsh insult, but to a British ear, maybe associating them with royalty gives them too much respect. Their actions were vulgar and in bad form.

[ProblemSolver]

Well said, lunar. The comment section over at the PS Blog is usually the place
to rise one's opinion. It's clear that the core community bothers much more
about the advert issue then anyone else. Speaking just within the boundaries of
WOZ isn't enough, because it doesn't get noticed that much. The press took on
the initial advert issue simply because it was a big story to post and not
because anyone of us had a problem with it. But with the latest patch none of
those magazine did anything similar despite the issue is much larger in its
scope now. So if the press doesn't take on the issue, and rising one's opinions
isn't enough, then "I think some form of general circular letter that we could
send to Sony and advertisers would be useful, to officially register our dismay
at this move, using our real names." might perhaps the best solution most can
be satisfied with. For sure, WipEout HD is just a game, but there is a huge
business behind. Offering someone a fault product or changing a product
afterwards for the worse isn't accepted anywhere whether its a game, a car, or
anything else. Up to my point of view an open letter does only serve the purpose
of documentation, which is very important in its own, but usually leads to
nothing. There are numerous example of this.

But let's stop talking, let's do it, since this thread will soon be forgotten.
And there won't be a second chance.

I will propose the following; Someone, the most skilled English writer over
here at WOZ who also knows how to write a proper article, will write a very
sound and solid open letter addressed to SCEE / STUDIO Liverpool which will
be sent over to them and which becomes sticky-closed within this forum. Even
if we gain nothing, we always have a proof that we did something about it.
I would be very satisfied if we can accomplish this.

So I ask everyone; who is in a position to do what I've wrote in the
subparagraph above?

[miufs]

Hi friends!

I still dont understand if the ads were TOTALLY removed with 2.10.

I bought the game today and i dont know if i should download the patch or leave the game as it is. :)

Please throw me a bone here! :)

Thanks!

[SaturnReturn]

Adverts are still present (or at least they were half an hour ago for me) and have not been removed. Adverse side effects from the 2.10 update are still being experienced. If you are able to play the game offline and enjoy it at the moment then I would suggest doing so. Hopefully once you've completed the campaigns and are ready to go online the situation might have improved.

[designer_79]

Here's a really great blog entry, that will speak most of our hearts. Great comparison to legal issues with other products and a possible outlook of in game ad placement in the near future, enjoy!

http://www.technotransition.com/2009/08/wipeout-hd-making-me-question-sonys.html

[QjonPL]

I've seen adverts before Zone. Maybe you were thinking of instances where offline you select "race again" and it loads the same track and same mode again in less than two seconds. I have not seen ads during those intervals.
No, no, I didn't get any Ads in separate sessions (when Zoning I always mix up 2 tracks).
So, I'm simply lucky :)

[Task]

One of the games was actually titled "Pure." Yet, this game was singled out among other Sony properties for such a brazen act.
Woah, I really don't think you can slag on Pure for this.
Sure, the bonus packs were heavily ad-oriented.
But they were free, and it was completely optional to install them.
Not only that, but it was easy to uninstall them at any later date!
Definitely, the "Coke Packs" were brazen adware of the worst sort, but they were free additions to your game that you could get, use, get a couple laughs out of, and then remove. Overall effect: no harm done.
That's really nothing in comparison to what they did to HD.


I will propose the following; Someone, the most killed English writer over
here at WOZ who also knows how to write a proper article
Most killed?
Wow, that's an interesting requirement!
But, you're the ProblemSolver, so I'll trust your solution is good! 8 )

I suggest opening a poll to find out who's been Contender Eliminated on WipeoutHD the most, that should find you the person you're looking for!

8 D

[krioto]

These guys are responsible www.doublefusion.com - email them here: ads@doublefusion.com

[Koleax]

Whoa, actually I never played Pure and didn't know a precedent had been set about DLC ad packs. That makes it so much worse!

I guess that really shows the direction they're going...

R.I.P. Wipeout :paperbag

[leungbok]

If i've well understood they choose wipeout HD because of it's 1080p ability.
I don't even own a HD tv and i have to suffer those ads, lol.

[QjonPL]

OK, I made 2 sh&^ty quality videos with my mobile - download:
http://www.speedyshare.com/263788256.html

With Ad - 15sec loading time
Without Ad - 10~11sec loading time

So that's a proof.

[SaturnReturn]

Thanks Qjon. LOL, did you name it "loads of free porn.rar" to get more downloads? It had the opposite effect one me, I was looking for the 'actual' d/l link for ages.:lol

Did you take the ones with ads first or second? I noticed last night that a single race took about 17 seconds at first. After that the same track only took 13 seconds. No adverts were involved either way. So something more conclusive might be necessary as proof. Or I could have just not mentioned that part. :P

I'm still fairly sure that an online game with only two or three players would now take a lot longer if an advert were involved. So if I can get a video of this I will. If only the invitation only function worked a little better. That would make things easier.

[YouAreFubar]

Im going to have to add my bit. Im aware that WipEout has always had its share of advertising in game, but its always been unobtrusive and in keeping with the games setting. However having to watch an advert before most races is absolutely doing my head in! What doesnt help is that these adverts detract from the futuristic environment the game is trying to set for itself. Rocky?!?!? Is he still alive after all these years? And Fat Princess..... My god I could do without having to watch that again!

Whats the problem with just changing a few of the in-game billboards to something they are advertising like in WipEout of old. This is seriously putting me off playing the game at the moment.

[QjonPL]

I was trying to record a with-ads-loading in the first, but I was getting only no-ads-loading (which I was deleting right after), so I was quitting right after loading and trying again the same stage, then I finally got an Ad-loading, which I recorded and uploaded, and after that I made a non-ad video, which I uploaded too.
So...
So maybe you shouldn't mention that xD
Anyway, Ads suck.


LOL, did you name it "loads of free porn.rar" to get more downloads?
That's almost my trademark on other forums ^^

[lunar]

Because of the name I got scared that your file had been replaced with something else, somehow, and I scanned it with every virus scanner I could get hold of! The video shows the loading times, but I think the best thing would be a side by side split screen comparison. If someone can record the files I can edit videos here. It doesn`t matter if the ads don`t make it hugely longer to load every time - if it is at all longer then it is no longer a loading screen, it is an advertisement screen.

[ProblemSolver]

... Most killed? ...
Holy! xD

[yeldar2097]

Today's breakdown: Played WO intermittently from 19:30 - 23:00 GMT

When going online I received a message detailing the changes made regarding the 2.10 patch which I hadn't seen before.

Offline: Started 3 SL sessions and 1 Zone session

Online: Hosted ~10 MP races, Raced in ~25 other MP races not hosted by me, Raced in an 8 Race tourney.

No adverts at all. Anyone else not got adverts today?

[SaturnReturn]

I hadn't played the game until you said that. Switched on, 1 race, no ad. 2nd race, Rocky. Nuff said.:(

Back to Pure and failing at Citta Nuova.

[nipsen]

About contacting Sony and so on.. true, that. But I still think the "being reasonable" alternative should include pointing out the graphical issues with the game after the patch. Ten seconds extra because of an advert - well, it's an advertisement screen, and it distracts me from playing the game. It ruins the feel of the game, and I feel pretty bad about it. Since it turns me off the game completely. But if the patch didn't change anything during the race, I think I could've managed somehow (while figuring out what sort of nails to put in the letter-bombs).

So the biggest issue for me is the microfreezes and aggressive scaling that didn't really exist in 2.0. I don't know if it actually was the same, and the problems just didn't turn up because none of the ads were being downloaded or saved on the disk during the races. But there's definitively something going on with the scaler, and the colour range. Another thing is the explosion effects - the black smoke, or the expanding fireball - either of those have changed. No doubt to make the game run smoother.

The question is if bringing those concerns to SL or Sony will actually cause anything at all. They evidently know about this in detail, and think that it's not significant enough that people will notice.

It's also esoteric enough in many ways to need much explanation before people can understand how it affects your gameplay experience. The same goes for the advertisements - in-game advertisements is not new, and the concept - just put them into the loading screens - will come off as completely understandable, and as if it doesn't affect gameplay in any way whatsoever. Any concerns people would have with this simply comes off as whining.

The solution, simply put is this: noise-campaign. Noise-campaigns successfully destroyed the MAG beta, they destroyed the Killzone 2 controls, and they scuttled Factor 5 and Lair. They also made cross-game chat become the alleged "number one wanted feature" on the PSN, as well as forced an early price-drop on the ps3. Whether you agree with the method or not, the fact remains that it's the only thing that has any chance whatsoever at actually affecting how Sony runs their business. Conversely, arguing with Sony has no chance of succeeding. I can tell you right now, that aside from Musterbuster, you're not going to find anyone in the entire hierarchy at Sony who isn't a sychophant to some degree, or who has not developed a convenient blindness for anything except their own particular project.

So here's my suggestion. We will craft a simplistic narrative that borders on lying from the wrong side, but which is catchy and easy to gather support for. Such as "Advertisements before gameplay". Or "Customers forced to pay for advertisement". The key is to have something that is immediately understandable for people who don't have the game, don't care about consoles as such. And that forces any disagreement to become stuttering techno-babble. In other words, we will turn the tables.

Afterwards, we'll flood any channels possible with this slight lie until it becomes truth. I'm talking about fake accounts, bite-sized blurbs sent to any kind of editor of any magazine or internet blog you can possibly think of, n4g, neogaf, etc.,etc. All of that will have to be accompanied by seemingly authentic internet outrage. Not polite, overly considerate and intelligently articulated opinion like we're seeing on this board, but unstoppable stupidity that cannot be argued with. The disagreement is essential, obviously - anyone has to disagree violently, but in vain. If anyone doubts this works, then I assure you that other forums have organised and managed to pull this off with as few as 20 people engaged for no more than a couple of hours every day over a week.

Whether there exists any kind of reasonable argument either way then swiftly becomes irrelevant. And so the demand will exist, just as the severe push against removing this atrocity altogether will be there. There will be no compromise, only damage control motivated by PR and marketing concerns. The only weakness to this strategy is that we cannot reasonably dictate the specifics. But let's face it - we won't do this anyway. It's quite clear that Sony considers us insignificant compared to their own ditto-groups and "institutionalized" test-audiences.

I'm suggesting this, because I have already sent a piece of my "updated" review around to various sources, and asking them to include this tidbit in any review on the blu-ray version - and haven't had as much as a single reply. In fact, I don't even know if anyone is going to have a review on the blu-ray release of the game at all. Which means that the best chance of making this an issue (outside a small notice in some magazine with a sympathetic editor), is.. noise-campaign.


..Obviously, all of this yelling and gnashing of teeth can be spared, if some marginably reasonable insider at SL or Sony will read this - and understand that they have no choice but to reassess their partnership with Digitalfusion, and consider any future deployment of advertisement in games very carefully.

Because frankly, I've had enough. And before I decide that I don't care any more, I believe I will have to do one final thing, as thanks for all the support Sony's marketing imps have given the community over the years. So feel free to join me in a little "amok time", if you'd like. ..


Or.. alternatively, just help me find magazines reviewing the blu-ray release, and demand that they will include the info about the advertisements in their overall assessment.

Eiher will do, I guess.

[ACE-FLO]

Still, HD Fury is a lot faster than Pulses' load times... and Pulse has no adverts :blarg...

...HD Fury adverts - no problem for me, seriously... and I work in an advertising infested environment - Publishing, Lord!

[yeldar2097]

Regarding my earlier post:

I have a theory (actually 3) which may explain why I didn't get any adverts this evening. I'm probably completely off-base with all of them but we shall see.

I will do some research and get back to you, whoever you is/are :lol

[ACE-FLO]

I'm gonna say something weird... I like the adverts! (oopsie)

OK - this requires an explanation... I'm used to pulses long load times, they helped me to prepare - get my mind in the zone, the right frame of mind to get rocking in online races...

skip forward to HD Fury, Load times are short - even with the adverts, and I feel like the game started too quick and I wasn't adequately prepared - so - nervous, I start the race and ping pong all over the place, cursing HD Fury's relatively short load times... eek...

... OK, the Lynch mob is coming, and I'm leaving... like NOW!

[Koleax]

ACE-FLO, it's possible the ads are less annoying where you live.

The first moments in which I saw the PixelJunk Monsters ad, I actually felt it was a little refreshing to see something different from the sideshift and barrel roll tips, but those moments were short-lived. I realized that I'd rather be bored during those 10 seconds than annoyed and offended.

Since all I see now is the Fat Princess ad, I wonder if PixelJunk pulled their ad because they knew it was being associated with so much negativity.

Either way, I have to think that the makers of Fat Princess are immune to that sort of thing. Their whole game is based around pointing and laughing at obese women locked in dungeons.

[leungbok]

I'm used to pulses long load times, they helped me to prepare - get my mind in the zone, the right frame of mind to get rocking in online races...

skip forward to HD Fury, Load times are short - even with the adverts, and I feel like the game started too quick and I wasn't adequately prepared - so - nervous, I start the race and ping pong all over the place, cursing HD Fury's relatively short load times... eek...

I second you on that. I need too, to have a little minute to relieve stress after being quaked, hit by canon-rockets-missiles-mines-bombs... and pushed out of track ! i'm often still upset when the tournament restarts and when i have to go back and swim with sharks :lol

[Task]

8 D Good one Ace!
Oddly enough, "customizable delay between races" was a feature suggested at the last Wipeout gathering I held!


Whats the problem with just changing a few of the in-game billboards to something they are advertising like in WipEout of old. This is seriously putting me off playing the game at the moment.
Well, I can answer you that one at least.
You see, what they've done (adding ads to the loading screen) is just what they could hack in sideways. This "in-game advertising initiative" is a new department in Sony (or something like that, it's been a week since I read that article), and they've just gone to whoever's in charge of HD and gotten them to shove the ads into the game in the fastest/cheapest way possible. We can see this since every time it's been done so far it's been a blight upon the product.
Integrating the ads into rotating trackside billboards would be an excellent implementation, I don't think anyone would complain about that. But the good solution takes more time and effort than the cheap and fast and ugly hack. And it would likely have to have been part of the initial design. They were way past release when it was desired as an "added feature", it's extremely difficult (if not entirely impossible) to make big changes like that at this point in the SDLC.
Primary problem: This new "in-game ad group" isn't interested in "good" or "value", it's only interested in quick cash.

[ACE-FLO]

there is a little comfort in the knowledge that if ads are to stay, they will only become more frequent and diverse, and the same ads will appear less frequently ... now if you think about it, that might be a little more tolerable than seeing fat princess or whoever she was, over and over... not ideal for those of you who liked life on the servers before the ads, granted! But, it is a start... my o.p

[Koleax]

That has not actually been the trend, Ace. It's only one ad now, whereas before it was too. Hopefully that means it will be zero eventually, but I would not be surprised if this ad and only this ad played for the next three months, and then perhaps with one and only one other ad for the next year.

I tried something close to what yeldar said, doing a few speed lap sessions offline, but the second I went online to do a multiplayer race, Fat Princess again.

I'm going to try to reinstall it without going online, as per ProblemSolver's method. If it's nice enough, and I expect it to be, you guys might not see me connected to PSN for a while.

[ProblemSolver]

@Koleax: But don't forget to logout each time you start WipEout HD after you
have installed it the way I wrote, otherwise you have to go through the whole
procedure again. ;)

[Xavier]

Integrating the ads into rotating trackside billboards would be an excellent implementation, I don't think anyone would complain about that.

I'd complain about it. The new Wipeout games are set in the year 2207, and having advertisements for early 21st century media (the majority of which -- even if they're enjoyable noe -- will be mostly forgotten in a decade) are just as jarring and mood-breaking as playing a modern-day Formula 1 racer and seeing things like this:

http://images.google.com/images?q=19th+century+advertisements

Or are we supposed to imagine that 200 years from now, there's a big retro fad going where people are advertising their products using 200-year-old images?

[TorquedSoul]

I dont care much for the adverts BUT I dont have much of a problem with Sony or SL using them to generate revenue. The discussion of putting adverts in games has being going on for a while. Simply because you pay for game doesn't mean you have a right to not see commercials. I dont recall any explicit declaration when I purchased the game that it would not contain commercials. They appeared to fix the delay problem with the ads and the ads themselves dont take much longer than the regular load screen now. So its not even a wasted of time at this point.

Given that most games are online multiplayer games these days, the need to advertise is important for the maintenance of the servers. Also from a product standpoint the business model has to change. Online play extends the life of many games. This means there is a need to extract revenue from the usage as well as the orignal content. I paid half for WipeOut HD than I did for most of my other PS3 games and I play it much more often.

advertising and entertainment go hand in hand. when you realized that 200 million game consoles are out there it becomes obvious that advertising is inevitable.

That said ... I'm sick of the Fat Princess ad ... please give me something else. How about some variety.

[ACE-FLO]

That has not actually been the trend, Ace. It's only one ad now, whereas before it was too. Hopefully that means it will be zero eventually...

In general, it is how advertising works. My guess is that the ads are bought by an agency, who will continue to purchase ads, as long as they hold the budget... I saw 2 different ads last night... repeated... but in January, I can foresee a lot more ads in circulation!

[IH8YOU]

I'd rather pay for additional service than have ads. ****, make WOHD a service where you must purchase the game again after a year to resume multiplayer gameplay.

With what im seeing, if the ads increase good for Sony, how much revnue will the remaining 5 players generate? At the rate of decline ive seen since 2.10 they'd be lucky to have 5 players come Feburary.

[nipsen]

With what im seeing, if the ads increase good for Sony, how much revnue will the remaining 5 players generate? At the rate of decline ive seen since 2.10 they'd be lucky to have 5 players come Feburary.
Ah. But then there will be no one left who will buy the game, so therefore it isn't worth the cost to improve the game until it isn't broken again. Such as, rolling it back to the previous version.

There's a marketing guy with this argument in the SCEE hierarchy somewhere, trust me. Most likely at the top.

[SaturnReturn]

I'm baffled. They surely want people to buy it? Fixing it now will bring a lot of people back, who were previously telling friends how great it is. People will not be put off by ads and will be more likely to buy it. The more that buy it, the more that will buy DLC in the future. No-one playing it means no revenue from future DLC. Now that I think about it, does this mean no more DLC? It could do. Perhaps they've decided that and therefore this is a last ditch effort to make money from the game. "Don't worry about existing customers, we have their cash now. Don't expressly warn new customers. They can by the game without even knowing the ads are there. We'll still get their money. It's win-win." Someone probably already mentioned that somewhere, and I'm speculating wildly, so I'll stop.

[yeldar2097]

2 days without ads now...was it something I said? :lol

not complaining though :P

[SaturnReturn]

Have you figured out why yet? I'm sure we all want to know. If you even have clues it could be good for people to try it themselves.

[ProblemSolver]

@yeldar2097: Just play offline, load 10 races, and tell me if they don't appear
there either. ASAP!

[SaturnReturn]

What's the magic word? :P

j/k - Sounds like there are more theories brewing. I really wanted an early night but might have to hang around a bit.

[ProblemSolver]

@SaturnReturn: Was already given; ASAP (an enhanced version for please). xD

Well, I might have found another solution to prevent from being spammed, even
while playing online! Since the ads are downloaded afterwards (about 25MB), one
can fill up his disc by creating an artificial large file (a large mp3 or mpeg file stored
on a possibly external HDD) such that only three or five megabytes are left after
copying it over to the primary disc. However, I wouldn't be surprised if the game says;
you need at least 25MB disc storage to play the game. xD Can someone figure it out
(someone who's disc is nearly full)? If there aren't any requirements on the space left
to play the game, then this method should work -- after one has installed the game
like I've written in one of my previous posts.

[Connavar]

Haha nice problem solving, but let's hope Ads were an afterthought, otherwise
maybe Fury already reserved some space in the HDD during its installation.

[ProblemSolver]

@Connavar: It doesn't, I've checked multiple times. If you install WipEout the
way I told, then the game takes about 187x megabytes. Once you start it up,
while being connected to the PSN, the background download starts. When done,
WipEout takes about 191x megabytes. ;)

I would test it out myself, but my primary disc has about 400GB left and the
largest partition on my external disc is only about 300GB. So it would takes
some time to get it done.

As an additional note to my previous post; just in case you have about one or two
gigabytes left, then you might also download something from the store (instead
of creating a mpeg file) that fills up you disc.

[krioto]

I can't take it any more!

So many ads! So many ads...

My personal favourite is the ps3 generic ad - what tosspot thought this was useful?

I'm done - it's wrecked the game.

[lunar]

2 days without ads now...was it something I said? :lol

not complaining though :P

I think it was your Haikus. They were so impressed they decided you don`t, like, you know, fit standard the gamer profile (http://www.doublefusion.com/gamers/html/index.html)that they are, like, targeting.

I don`t know if the stuff on that page is real, it is at best fairly selective and very patronising. Anyway all I know is I really like, like Rocky films for some reason now and I want some.

With reference to earlier discussions about terms and conditions, I have found that even if there are terms and conditions that allow Sony to make a material change to a game without the offer of a refund, this is not necessarily allowed under UK trading regulations.

http://www.oft.gov.uk/advice_and_resources/resource_base/legal/unfair-terms/

[nipsen]

..probably.. any trade regulation. If the user-agreement changes, or the service you've bought changes.. you have every kind of right to claim your money back. That Sony doesn't explicitly inform you somewhere along the way so you can agree to it is their fault, really. So, a change in the agreement happened. ..And I doubt Sony will actually dare to refuse you - because then they would have to show you where it says in the agreement that they can change anything at any time, even inserting advertisements and changing the quality of the game at some point. Which would be excellent PR.

..I wish they'd refuse, really.

[yeldar2097]

@PS: do you want me to finish the races or merely start/exit them?

[Constrictor]

Got a localized 'Braveheart Blu-Ray' today :blarg

[Koleax]

I'm going to try out the space limitation thing, PS. It's just taking a while for me to load up the drive. Even if it works, I suspect it will not be that great of a solution for me, because I take a lot of pictures in photo mode and not having enough space will put another damper on things. Worth a shot, though! Maybe we'll learn something new and interesting in the process.

Update: Not good. The game would not start with less than 50 MB while signed in to PSN, saying there was not enough space to install trophy information. I made the necessary space and started it up, and immediately quit. I noticed that somehow I lost about 16 MB of free space and WHD had gained about 16 MB. I started it up, played a single race offline, saw an ad, and I could not have said the F-word loudly enough.


They were so impressed they decided you don`t, like, you know, fit standard the gamer profile (http://www.doublefusion.com/gamers/html/index.html)that they are, like, targeting.
Oh man.

"I think being in a game is way better because in TV it can sometimes annoy you and stuff and can have a negative effect on a product. But in a game, I think it has a positive effect."
Do they even read their own website? These ads are just like TV ads and every bit as annoying.

[DrMannevond]

I think it was your Haikus. They were so impressed they decided you don`t, like, you know, fit standard the gamer profile (http://www.doublefusion.com/gamers/html/index.html)that they are, like, targeting.

I don`t know if the stuff on that page is real, it is at best fairly selective and very patronising. Anyway all I know is I really like, like Rocky films for some reason now and I want some.


'Real' is not the right word here I think. The report they're quoting is named at the bottom of the page. If you google it you will find that the report was commissioned by - yes, you guessed it - Double Fusion:eek
(The report is 'Videogame Advertising Engagement Study', it was done by 'Interpret LLC' in 2007).
Here's a press release about the report, describing among other things their methodology :
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0EIN/is_2007_July_23/ai_n19378379/

I especially like their definition of a worldwide market (New York, L.A. and London:D)

[RJ O'Connell]

I'm seeking new gaming challenges at the moment so I've had no time for Wipeout HD. Or this forum, for that matter.

[multibodydynamics]

@RJ O' Connell: You're really missing the point here... Wipeout has always been a rewarding game for addicted players. I played WO2097 every day when I came home from school for over a year back in -97 and never got tired of it. You can proceed to other games, but this only shows that you are not a true fan of the series. Addicted Wipeout-players are not finished with this game until there is a better Wipeout out there to play... Yes, I'm a D-padder!

[SaturnReturn]

:blarg What's going on. D-padder? These last two posts don't look like they belong. The last one looks like it belongs here:
http://www.wipeoutzone.com/forum/showthread.php?p=158162#post158162

Or did I miss something?:dizzy

[Koleax]

Good news. It might be that you don't have to consider space limitations at all. Since the game apparently downloads the ad right away at the beginning, during the intro sequence, and not streaming during the loading sequence, it may be enough to simply never start the game while online. Always start the game offline, then sign in afterward. After a fresh reinstall, I didn't see any ads, while doing that last night.

If that doesn't work, you can always get around the 50 MB free space requirement at the beginning by starting the game offline, taking a bunch of photos in photo mode, until you run out of space, then go online, something (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v718/psients/wohd_20091112_182044.jpg) that (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v718/psients/wohd_20091112_184116.jpg) I was (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v718/psients/wohd_20091112_183348.jpg) very (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v718/psients/wohd_20091112_183445.jpg) happy (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v718/psients/wohd_20091112_184554.jpg) to (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v718/psients/wohd_20091112_191557.jpg) test (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v718/psients/wohd_20091112_202421.jpg).

[kanar]

I'll test that soon Koleax, cos' seriously after my first ad experience yesterday, I'm seeing Rocky everywhere now. This is truly nonsense, I can't understand the meaning of this "experiment". 3 ads rolling in circle, endlessly. really dumb. Would have been less difficult to deal with them if we had a perfect online experience, after one year of exploitation, could had been the case, no? But well, technical problems (micro-freezes, audio off, crazy weapons/respawn/ramming/framerate drops/stutters/delayed starts blah blah blah) not all related to bandwidth are still there. I'm ready to pay, as it has been said everywhere, to get Rocky removed from my ps3. This money could help to improve the online experience, maybe.

[yeldar2097]

It makes the avalon chatbox quite funny though, don't you think? :g

Nice find Koleax (and nice photos), will have a look into that.

I didn't get ads for about 3days (last tue,wed,thu) but now they're back! o_O


Edit: Hooray for no more ads!!! Koleax I think I love you

Just for reference you don't need to do a clean install, you just have to start WO while bein signed out of PSN :)

[Koleax]

Just building on ProblemSolver's efforts, standing on the shoulders of a giant. :) Where is he, btw?

Has everyone tried this now? Is it working? If not, let's iron out the issues so we can spread the word.

[Constrictor]

Well, yesterday Andybob told me about this tweak. Happy as if it was my '09 xmas present. btw, it's working for him he wrote.

I tried ... and failed.

Setup: Latest WOHD+Fury 2.10 installed w/ >300 ads played to day. :dizzy

Maybe important: German PSN account and I've a static IP ...

Test 1: PS3 + WOHD already running -> close WO -> sign out PSN -> start WO -> Main menu sign in PSN via XMB -> go WO online -> got ads

Test 2: PS3 turned off -> PS3 on w/o PSN -> start WO -> WO Main menu and sign in PSN via XMB -> go WO online -> got ads

Test3: tbd WOHD new install

So I'm still with Braveheart and Rocky and redundant stuff

cheers

[Koleax]

Definitely try the fresh reinstall. That's what I did. It wouldn't work for me without the reinstall either.

It looks like just the people in the UK may not have to reinstall. The ads are localized so it must have something to do with their specific delivery.

It shouldn't take long and you only need to do it once. Let us know how it goes!

[krioto]

It worked for me.

Loaded up the game, waited until I got to the main menu screen.

Then turned on the router. Signed in - no ads!!!!!:dizzy

Thanks heaps koleax.

[Frances_Penfold]

I think it was your Haikus. They were so impressed they decided you don`t, like, you know, fit standard the gamer profile (http://www.doublefusion.com/gamers/html/index.html)that they are, like, targeting.


Holy Jesus the content on that page is stupid.

[ACE-FLO]

yes, ridiculous. Where did they get those stats from? and in 2007? those comments left by gamers, were too staged to be convincing. I'd lol but this isn't funny...

[DrMannevond]

Well, what can you expect when they first commission the report, and then use it to build their own case. The word deceptive springs to mind:rolleyes:

[Amorbis]

The website might be more true if the adverts were implemented in a more fitting fashion, for example billboards, otherwise the website sounds scandalous. They shouldn't really expect us to have a positive response when the adverts hinder loading times in some cases, are really loud, offer worthless information (PS3 advert whilst playing the PS3) and a very slim amount of adverts which repeat none stop and sometimes the same advert gets shown multiple times over (I'm sure the Rocky advert was shown to me around 10 times in a row to me on Friday's Avalon night). The adverts have also been added after the game has been launched, it wouldn't be so bad if didn't have to adjust to them.

Instead of video adverts I would have much preferred subtle product placement a la 2097. Having adverts on billboards, ship liveries and maybe even an image on a loading screen wouldn't be intruding on the game experience.

It could be worse, I suppose. The failed Gizmondo games console forced basic users to watch adverts before they'd even played a game!

And thanks, Koleax, for your discovery. As long as I don't forget to do it I'll never suffer Rocky again. :)

[brummpahh]

Hi all,

2 m8's told me that they have (fortunatly) no sound
while ads popping up outa hell.

We cross checked and this is how you can at least
remove the sound:
- turn on sound over HDMI
- turn on (manually) 5.1 over HMDI
- turn on secondary sound output (and use optical cable)
this way you'll never hear "Rockyyyyyyyyyyyy"
again. (until 2.20 maybe)

Little hint: when you open a chat window, this will cover the ad allmost completly.

hope they will go bankrupt for that "feature".

brummpahh

[IH8YOU]

brumm - if that works - I owe you BIG TIME. Gonna test it tonight.

You don't lose 5.1 over optical, do you? As I REQUIRE 5.1 in order to survive using my old-school 2097 HUD. (no other way to "know" where the Vartizan-Ninjas are sneaking up for a kill with that HUD otherwise)

[Aeroracer]

just played wipeout hd with these new adverts.
wow they are evasive and rubbish.:turd
when they play they stop the loading bar so the length on the advert is added to the loading time of the race.
i know SL or sony or whoever have got to earn a living but i paid for my game so its mine..not thiers
its almost like you get up in morning get into your car to goto work and the garage you bought the car from had sneaked around at night to paint adverts on the side of the car.

i will try these above methods to see if i can get rid of them but it looks a bit complicated to me..:)

[IH8YOU]

Jasmin some car dealers out here actually do that! Take your car in for new brakes, you get a new "Dipshite VW" affixed to your boot. When i got my first GTi years ago the dealer installed an emblem to the hatch AFTER I bought it. When i demanded to know why thet defaced my property i was told they did it so i would revieve prompt service there later on. ( theyed know i was a loyal customer ) After making a scene in the showroom, they refunded my 500 for the misunderstanding. Ugh, 10 years later and it still pisses me off. ;-)

[Constrictor]

@IH8YOU: That's funny. And now it's off-topic. Story: You got your new bad-ass sportscar, roll cage, lightweight rims w/ new tries and suspension and maybe some additional show-off-stuff and when you get your car back from your dealer (who has to upgrade the cars firmware to go beyond 180 mph) you found that new license plate frame saying something like: xyz your dealer with heart ... WTF! I'm not friendly, I won't let anybody pass below 150mph and the left lane on the autobahn is mine - I'm a heartless petrol-head. That happened w/ 3 cars in a row and I'm still pissed, too. ;)

On topic:

@brummpahh: Did this PSN offline tweak work for you?

[Aeroracer]

@IH8YOU

i feel for you.that must have been ealy annoying.:nod

[brummpahh]

@IH8YOU: i can't test 5.1 over SPDIF, since i only
have a digital headphone amp attached to it.
Another m8's turned on 5.1DD manually without
HDMI sound output and the trick still worked. Seems
that they cannot "upsample" their monotone
messages to 5.1. (they'd have to pay license fees 4
the encoder, lol ?)
It worked with my old 40GB model and the new slim type
of a m8 (german PS3's).

@constrictor:
i didn't try to setup the game new, since i'm afraid to
mess up or loose my ghosts or besttimes (~150 files
in my WO folder).

btw: i installed a solid state disk with 230MB/s read rate
some weeks ago and loading times were down to (!)
3..5 seconds. This now only applies to lucky moments
without ads. With ads it's up to 10 to 15secs +.
Grrrrrr.

[Constrictor]

So without reinstall the tweak does not work for you either? Same here! I didn't try a fresh install to date.

[mizunoori]

Same here Constrictor. With no reinstall it doesn´t work for me. (Or I´m too stupid and doing something wrong)

[siriusbee]

I skimmed through this thread, and I don't think I saw the following mentioned: there is a thread on the playstation boards on a way to block ads with your firewall which may or may not work for you:

http://boardsus.playstation.com/playstation/board/message?board.id=ps3dlgames&thread.id=175388

[Koleax]

All my times stayed after reinstall. I will check later about ghosts.

[lunar]

That router fix is a touch geeky for me ;) but he makes a fair point that those with low internet speed can really suffer while these ads are doing what they do. Some people need all the bandwidth they can get to play online. Advertisements add insult to injury for these people.

Gaming websites are picking up on the return of ads a bit more. Joystiq put out a news report about it today. Just Google "Wipeout HD Adverts". More websites ought to report this.

Anyway, I think that everyone who dislikes these adverts and wants them gone really ought to complain directly to their local or national Sony customer services. Does anyone know of a good, working email address for UK Playstation customer services?

[siriusbee]

Yeah, it's geeky, but it's probably the most surefire way to prevent them -- basically deny traffic from the ad servers. Also, the guy in that post claims that ad content was being downloaded *during* an online race. Haven't verified that claim yet, but if it's true, that's really bad for people with connections that aren't too awesome.

As to complaints, why complain to Sony when you could complain directly to the advertisers? If enough people told specific advertisers that these ads don't do anything for them (and that they maybe even create negative vibes), it'll probably be more effective than complaining to Sony.

[Koleax]

All my ghosts are there. So, anyone who is not reinstalling the game for fear of losing their times or ghosts, fear not! You can always back them up, too.

I seriously doubt the ads are downloaded during races or any time after the game's intro sequence. If that were the case, I should have seen a bunch of ads by now.

[Amorbis]

I would like to try that router method, but I'm not so good with that sort of thing, I'll stick with the old sign-in later method for now. What concerns me about the guide is that adverts download almost 100mb of data in a session, which annoys me as I have a monthly bandwidth limit on my internet. Why should I waste my bandwidth on something I don't want to see? And run the possibility of losing the internet until the end of the month (I'm exaggerating a bit thought as I have a 40GB limit, but I'm still annoyed.)

[DrMannevond]

Just for fun I sent an email to Sony Norway asking to cancel my purchase of Wipeout HD. I'm expecting an answer along the lines of 'HAHA! We already have your money so go **** yourself', but one can always hope.

[nipsen]

..I send a mail to them once in a while as well. Something like "congratulations on another excellent localisation job.. but "artifakt" is not a Norwegian word". Or "I would dearly like to give you more money and buy a psp - but there are no ps1 titles I want on the store right now - can you help me?". But I never get any mail back. :( *cries*

[Rezatron]

I got my first ad only last night. What's up with that? I recall other Canadians saying they got ads (I think?) so this comes off a bit strange. It's only one ad too and I see it almost every load screen (trailer for the movie "Armored").

[multibodydynamics]

There hasn't been any ads during loading screens for me the last days now. Are they removed again or do they come and go? Maybe they noticed our loud complaints?

[Dark_Phantom_89]

The ONLY ad I get now is the Fight Club one. It's getting really annoying having to constantly hear "the first rule of fight club is, you do not talk about fight club" and "this is too much."

[Koleax]

Dark Phantom, are you making sure only to start the game while offline?

[KGB]

I start the game offline and get the adverts all the time, but with no sound usually.

[Koleax]

I'm guessing you're not in the UK? Have you tried a fresh reinstall first, then making sure to always start the game offline?

[SaturnReturn]

KGB was in the UK last time I checked. That's not to say I'm checking or anything. I'm not a stalker, I swear.

[DawnFireDragoon]

so the ads are still in the game then. :-

meh. :|

i haven't bothered playing it since they appeared....and will continue not too.

[Koleax]

KGB was in the UK last time I checked. That's not to say I'm checking or anything. I'm not a stalker, I swear.

As mentioned earlier by yeldar, it seemed like those in the UK did not need to do a fresh reinstall.

But, guys, I have not heard anyone say that they were still seeing ads after a fresh reinstall and making sure to always start the game offline.

I've posted in both the UK and American PSN forums. This looks like the real deal, so try it out and let us know if you're still getting ads.

[SaturnReturn]

It's the first time I've played in a while. The logging in after loading up trick has stopped working for me too. It's a shame that sharing solutions with each other in this way also means sharing them with people who can nullify the solution and bring the problem right back again. I think we all saw it coming, but it's still a shame.

[infoxicated]

I wonder if it'd be possible to narrow down the IP address that the adverts are being served from and just block that on the router?

[SaturnReturn]

I think that's the same method someone mentioned earlier. I'd try it if I still played the game often enough to bother.

[Koleax]

I hope I don't sound like a broken record. Can you confirm, SaturnReturn, that at some point you did a fresh reinstall, then made sure to always start the game while offline, and you still saw ads?

[SaturnReturn]

Nope. No fresh install. I was just confirming that the super easy method that worked for us in the UK before no longer works. I don't play it enough to bother with a fresh install. Tonight was the first time since just after Avalon I think, or possibly even since Avalon itself. Even if I did find a method that worked, I wouldn't be confirming it here, because no doubt it would no longer work shortly afterward.

Maybe someone with enough remaining enthusiasm for HD can help Koleax confirm his theory.

[Koleax]

Well, the super easy method never worked for me, so I don't see any reason why it should have worked for anyone else.

If someone wants to "fix" the ordinarily easy method, then it'd be like they were declaring spam war or something. The more people who know, the better.

[yeldar2097]

Yeah super easy method no longer works for me either.
Not getting ads offline though, only online...
:)

[Koleax]

Are they new ads you've never seen before?

[yeldar2097]

Yeah but apparently the ads have changed from the original ones anyway: Rocky is out, Fight Club is in.

Might give a fresh install a try sometime this weekend. Will probs take about 10 years to download again (just like the first time :lol) but we'll see how it goes.

[Koleax]

If you have a connection fast enough to play the game smoothly online, it really shouldn't take much more than 15 minutes, right?

[yeldar2097]

Ahahahahahaha! 15 minutes?! That would make the game around 70mb with my average dl speed :g
The joys of broadband eh? :P

[Lance]

Alright, a chance for a 'pissing contest'! Two nights ago, I downloaded a free 575 Meg 3D landscape program. It took less than 13 minutes. [And it would have been less than half that if their server could have delivered it as fast as my connection will go. So the real ultimate limitation on download speed is how much of a load the onsite server can deliver, not on the rate you can take it. It may not be worth paying for the extra download speed. Most servers do not seem to deliver data nearly as fast as the one I'm talking about did, which was about 750 KiloBytes/5.65 Megabits per second]

Too bad the program was crap. One day after I installed it, I uninstalled it and the installer as well. More than a GB of wasted space.

But back on topic, one or more people from SCEE definitely watch this thread, whatever their purpose in doing so may be, for good or ill as defined by the posters here.

[yeldar2097]

I know dl speed isn't just dependent on one's connection, tis plain :)
Having said that I have NEVER managed to obtain over ~90Kb/s at my house so I reckon my net has something to do with it. Damn you countryside internet! :lol

/offtopic


PMs here we come :+

/epic unsubtlety :g

[Koleax]

But back on topic, one or more people from SCEE definitely watch this thread, whatever their purpose in doing so may be, for good or ill as defined by the posters here.
Or for naught, since they're probably not involved in ad-related decisions. Maybe they want to play the game without ads. :nod

Really, I wouldn't fear some retaliatory move. Do they really want to cage their paying customers into watching ads and enforce against clearly innocent means to avoid watching them? Do they really think spam war is a good business model?

[DrMannevond]

Wow! I actually got a reply from sony norway about my desire to cancel my purchase of wipeout hd. It was of course only an automatic reply, but still.:P
What it said was something like this : We have recently updated our user-agreement to reflect certain changes made lately, and it included a link to this new and improved agreement. Only problem is, the agreement doesn't exist in norwegian (norwegian site points to english text version) which makes it invalid in norway. Also, the agreement was last updated 15. october 2008, which doesn't really make it recent. There is an updated user agreement available in norwegian, but only for the ps3 firmware:brickwall
I sent them a reply asking for an answer from a real human pointing me towards a valid user-agreement allowing them to force-feed me ads, and also pointed out the fact that they are breaking norwegian law. I'm eagerly awaiting an answer:)
(@Lance : No, I'm not gonna sue them, I'm just going to be a pain in the ass until they give me a good answer:nod).

[brummpahh]

Thumbs up for you, Dr. Mannevond.

For anyone SC** reading, calculate this:
my new beamer is not a S**Y, congratulations.
The update 2.10 is a big part of that decision.

now calculate how many Rockys ads you have to force
on customers to earn this loss.

Have fun, salesmen.

[abukii]

Wow. I could go on, but Id hate to ruin the flow here...

Overreactive comes to mind though.

[Frances_Penfold]

I really, really hate commercials myself-- but even I am amazed at the backlash evident in this thread.

The inclusion of commercials seems to have taken the wind out of the sails for WOHD in a big way, if this thread is any indication.

(You guys should go play WipEout PurE now instead!)

[DrMannevond]

Wow. I could go on, but Id hate to ruin the flow here...

Overreactive comes to mind though.

Hehe, yeah, I can be a grumpy bastard sometimes:), but I honestly don't think I'm overreacting. It's pretty obvious to me that this is just the first small steps down a very slippery slope, and the more Hell we raise now the bigger the chance they will think twice before doing something like this again in the future (Ok, not bloody likely since this is the second time already...). And it's not that I just hate commercials (well, I do), but it's the specific way they have been stuffed down our throats, and they couldn't even bother to implement it in a way that makes sense. I wouldn't have a problem with this if it was in-game billboards or holograms or corporate logos on the ship skins, but it's not. It's a forced commercial break between races that completely ruins the feel of the game. If the game was free, or cheaper I could even handle that, but it's not. I paid money for an ad-free game. End of story.

Edit : @Abukii : Just noticed you're from the US, so I guess you're a bit more used to commercials than I am. I have to admit that the first time I was in the US I was shocked at the sheer amount of ads everywhere. The problem is, that's not the norm, it's the exception. And when an American company cooks up an ad-delivery system like this and base their decisions on market research done in NY, LA and London there's bound to be friction, because they are forcing something they see as normal on a bunch of people (Europeans to start with) who don't. I'm not dissing the US or anything, I love it here (I'm typing this from my brother's couch in Jacksonville) and I spend a couple of months here every year, but man, it's great to come home and turn on the TV and not see an ad for a whole half hour:D

[Lance]

You should be watching PBS? Sometimes you can watch tv on PBS for an hour, an hour and a half, or even two hours without seeing a commercial. On commercial tv, it will generally be 10 minutes or less between commercials, and the commercials will last for five minutes.

I'm an American who has grown up with commercials everywhere, and I despise very nearly one-hundred percent of them. It is rare to see a commercial that is entertaining and which doesn't fundamentally expect you to be too stupid to see its manipulations or ask the obvious questions which would undermine its claims. And so many of them are loud. Bless that man who worked for the Zenith company [former manufacturers of tv and radio and et cetera] and invented the remote control. Commercials usually produce in me the opposite reaction to what they were intended to, so that I feel ill-will toward the company that sponsored them. Exceptions to this exist, but they sit in isolated lonely splendour.

BTW, hello from Orlando. :)

[DrMannevond]

My feelings exactly when it comes to commercials. I usually loose all hope in humanity after an hour of TV.:D
BTW : If you look out your window right about now you might see my niece flying past on the Polar Express. She will be the one going :hyper:lol

[Lance]

I didn't know it passed through here. I shoulda been waiting outside for it; I've not been to see Santa for a long time. What did I do with that bell? hmmmmm....

[Koleax]

I stopped watching TV almost completely a few years ago. Used to just be cable news and the History Channel, but then I discovered MVGroup and figured out that the news wasn't really informing me of anything. So after I started living on my own, I didn't see the need to buy cable. I didn't even have a TV for a while. Really! I remember thinking as a kid what that would have been like and it was, well, unthinkable. But it's much easier now with the Internet. :pc

After four or five months, a friend bought a plasma screen and gave me his old CRT. I thought I would just play some PS1 games on it, but it happened. It's a precious memory, the fascination of being very bored and looking for something good "over the air" with an antenna, watching those ads saying to get ready for the change to digital. I was looking at it with fresh eyes, noticing the analog signal coming through the static and thinking "this will never happen again."

I discovered "Two and a Half Men" and then laughed my ass off. Pretty soon I was watching it every day and had conversations with friends that included phrases like, "did you see yesterday's episode?" It felt so retro and charming. Along with the show itself, it made me remember being a naughty kid watching TV when I wasn't supposed to or watching a show that was too grown-up for me.

It was all free and non-commital. I didn't have to read an agreement or subscribe to anything. It was like a gift. No, it actually was a gift. I could take it or leave it and not give it another thought. I could watch it without feeling susceptible to contractual manipulation. The ads came with it like wrapping or interesting package stuffing. It got in the way some, but you knew that their purpose was to keep the contents protected for you, so that when you unwrapped it you'd find something good. So yeah, there were ads, but I wouldn't give up that memory for anything.

If Wipeout HD were free, and it relied on television-style loading screen ads? That'd be great. The chance to play it would be a gift for all and each person could take it or leave it, no worries. The pressure would be on SL and its advertisers to make the game worth playing, not worth buying. That's the key distinction that game makers are ironically not used to making. Instead they've been primarily concerned with making a game worth buying. How much it's worth playing is an important but secondary concern. This is manifested in WHD by things like increased frame-dropping and broken leaderboards. That's just the nature of the one-time purchase business model.

An entirely ad-supported business model would put primary focus on making the game worth playing again and again. It would have to be designed so that it wouldn't push people away but invite and welcome them. I am not against that and imagine a lot of people aren't, so I think it would be a sustainable business model. Unfortunately that's not what was tried. They tried both strategies and so lost their focus. Forget the art and the quality of the game for a second. This is flawed business management. There's no coherent strategy for bringing this game to market and making a profit.

That's the real reason I don't fear any updates that would "fix" the ad avoidance method of a fresh reinstall and making sure to always start the game offline. They're just not focused enough to implement that sort of strategy, much less have the daring to try.

[XBARNSTERX]

The ONLY ad I get now is the Fight Club one. It's getting really annoying having to constantly hear "the first rule of fight club is, you do not talk about fight club" and "this is too much."

Same here, not only have they ruined the game but the film too. Its just not on:bomb

[mizunoori]

I only get Rocky and Braveheart. Fight Club is too brutal to be shown in germany lol.
It is a little strange that we get only one or two ads now. Maybe there will be no new ads?? But I still need to get rid of them.
I think i try a fresh install.

[Dark_Phantom_89]

Strangely enough, I haven't had any ads for 2 days now. Is this too good to be true? Probably

[DrMannevond]

@Lance : Apparently the Polar Express broke down yesterday, so it never got out of the station:p
@Koleax : History Channel used to be the only channel I ever bothered watching too, but after my local cable company decided they'd rather have another sports-channel instead I just stopped watching TV. I've been slinking back occasionally after I got BBC entertainment, which is commercial free, thank god. I also watch the news on the norwegian version of PBS, NRK, just because it sounds so cool when you pronounce it (It's short for 'Norsk Rikskringkasting'. I dare any of you to pronounce it correctly:)), and because it's paid for through taxes like BBC, so they can do stunts like this
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWwQhPF-M6A
without having to worry about losing any money over it (It's from their main competitor's evening news, which is a commercial channel):D

On-topic : Why is everyone seeing ads for movies. All I get is Motorstorm and Ghostbusters. By now I would be thrilled to see one of the infamous Rocky ads. (http://javascript%3Cb%3E%3C/b%3E:%20leoHighlightsIFrameClose%28%29;)
(http://javascript%3Cb%3E%3C/b%3E:%20leoHighlightsIFrameClose%28%29;)

(javascript: leoHighlightsIFrameClose();)

[abukii]

Oddly enough, in the last 5 days, Ive played HD twice and not a single ad in either of the sessions. When I was getting them it was Fat Princess.

[phaeton_pl]

I have NO ADS for at least one week. My friend don't have them too :dizzy

[brummpahh]

Hi all,

today i did the fresh install (made a harddisk copy before...)
to bann Rocky 4ever. (it showed up every 2nd race,
untolerably, even without sound...)
Fury did not work after that. WO classic was ok. Besttimes/ghosts still being present.

Nothing to loose, fury has to work, too:
I went online, 2.10 installed and just when the game
wanted to load after the "update", i unplugged the network
cable crossing fingers for not being infected a 2nd time
upon startup.

Ads were gone. Rocky dead. Thx Koleax !
I now enter online via XMB, having started WO before.
Works. Throphies synched. Back to normal. No ads.

Made a new harddisk copy just in case they'd "improve"
via update.

[Koleax]

Excellent!

That's international confirmation. Now would someone in the UK do it already?

[yeldar2097]

The 'old' non-fresh install method works both online and offline for me again :+

[Koleax]

D'oh, it didn't work before. That means it doesn't work. :-

[yeldar2097]

Eh? what doesn't work? I'm lost...

For a few days with the 'old' sign in after booting (without fresh install) I got ads while in multiplayer.

Did the same today and I had no ads whatsoever. Surely that's a good sign? right?

I'm worried now...

:g

[Koleax]

No, that's not a sign that ads are being blocked, if you did the same thing before and saw ads.

Let's go, Britons! Fresh reinstall. Do it during tea time. :coffee

[novide]

i changed nothing and i am ad-free since one week..

[ProblemSolver]

Just building on ProblemSolver's efforts, standing on the shoulders of a giant. :) Where is he, btw? ...
;)

Long time no post. I don't play WOHD for about five weeks now in part of some
new projects I'm running and mainly because I got bothered by the ads too much.
I'm currently at the point where I would sell WipEout HD to refund my money.
The way we got treated with all the advert crap realy breaks my heart. The only
thing that holds me up is when thinking about all the artist who have spent so
much of their time into the game, esp. Rita's work on the ZONE mode. But thanx
Koleax (and others) for trying new methods to circumvent the ads and for not
stopping to complain about the issue over here and on other messages boards. I
will try your method and the Router method tonight. I hope it works out for me
because otherwise my interest in WipEout HD will converge to zero. I'm not
willing to play a game where I got treated like a stupit customer who should eat
everything thrown upon his feets. That's not my standard.

[ProblemSolver]

I wanna add that since the ads appeared in WipEout HD most of my close friends
have stopped playing online. :| I really enjoyed the fun with all of them, the
game starts to slips off of our hands.... :frown:

[IH8YOU]

ProblemSolver 100% with you here. I ONLY play if my close friends are on, and even then I tire quickly between ads, quakes that dont fire, leaderboards that are broken - and the newest nail in the coffin: getting thrown from games due to 'server errors' on the last 1/2 of the final lap during races. Mind you its not a psn or internet error - everything still works fine... You just keep getting booted from races. After all that I just... Meh.

[leungbok]

oops ! i'm not on that thread ? http://www.wipeoutzone.com/forum/showthread.php?t=7003
;)

[DrMannevond]

I got another reply from Sony today. Apparently I agreed to be bound by english law when I clicked ok somewhere, so I started reading english e-marketing law. I found this :

Confidentiality of communications
6. - (1) Subject to paragraph (4), a person shall not use an electronic communications network to store information, or to gain access to information stored, in the terminal equipment of a subscriber or user unless the requirements of paragraph (2) are met.

(2) The requirements are that the subscriber or user of that terminal equipment -



(a) is provided with clear and comprehensive information about the purposes of the storage of, or access to, that information; and

(b) is given the opportunity to refuse the storage of or access to that information.

(3) Where an electronic communications network is used by the same person to store or access information in the terminal equipment of a subscriber or user on more than one occasion, it is sufficient for the purposes of this regulation that the requirements of paragraph (2) are met in respect of the initial use.

(4) Paragraph (1) shall not apply to the technical storage of, or access to, information -




(a) for the sole purpose of carrying out or facilitating the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network; or

(b) where such storage or access is strictly necessary for the provision of an information society service requested by the subscriber or user.

http://www.opsi.gov.uk/si/si2003/20032426.htm

Can someone please translate this into human-readable language?
Does paragraph 4 exclude paragraph 2 also, since it is dependent on paragraph 1? Gaah! My head is exploding.

[abukii]

Terminal equipment = your system or storage device.

The rest is about sharing stored "equipment" on shared systems.

Basically you cant. Basically, you cant even store it...unless 'they' give you permission.

Think beta rules (assuming youve ever agreed to an NDA). I dont think this has anything to do with streaming ads though.

*I think*
**edit** This is why we have lawyers (the cool kind).

[lunar]

I`m not sure I can accurately decode that, either, and I can`t tell how relevant it is. However, if this English law applies to you then surely it applies to both sides in the contract - it applies to whoever runs your PSN also. I guess they are saying that you clicked okay to some terms and conditions somewhere, but English law also states that such terms may be regarded as unfair if they are "enabling the seller or supplier to alter unilaterally without a valid reason any characteristics of the product or service to be provided;"

http://www.opsi.gov.uk/si/si1999/19992083.htm

None of this is going to be tested in a court and we can all look at law on the internet. I highly doubt they are standing on any firmer legal ground than you are here. Well done on getting a response. :)

[SaturnReturn]

@Dr Mannevond

I have no idea whether this is right, but the way I read that is like this:

No-one should be able to use the internet to store data on your PS3 unless they tell you all about it and offer you the chance to say no thanks.

If they offer you the chance once and you say yes please, then they can assume you will say yes please to it again in future and keep doing it.

The above don't apply if it's necessary to provide the service in the first place.

[brummpahh]

Hi Sat,

"the chance of saying no thanks" was similar to
asking someone if he want's to live while holding
a revolver agains his head. (ok exaggerated...:) )
If you'd say no, you'll not be able to use a basic
function of the game anymore: online playing.
Sounds a little like blackmailing, does it ?

German "Verbraucherschutz" did not answer my letter,
instead they offered me a personal answer for 15 euros.
Ha, better moneymakers than the industry !

No joke.

[SaturnReturn]

I think it's open to interpretation to be honest. From what I can tell, I don't think paragraph 4 applies here. The adverts aren't required for the sole purpose of the communication. 4 (b) only applies if the user has given a direct request for the information society service (http://www.legaltext.ee/text/en/X80043.htm), which no-one here ever made. I think such a thing is meant to work the other way around anyway, i.e. a person accepts the storage based on them getting some renumeration from it. Maybe the term 'direct request' could mean different things. I reckon even the simple sounding things can probably have a completely different meaning in law.
I don't think storage of the data for the adverts complies with paragraph 2 at all. I can't remember what information was provided with the update. But I don't think it was clear and comprehensive, based on the fact that I wasn't informed I'd have information stored on my terminal device. I therefore definitely didn't have the option to decline having that data stored either, even if I did have the option to not update. Anyway, I'm not a lawboy. I'm just trying to interpret that a bit for those not as confident in their English skills to be able to crack the code. Whatever the case, it wouldn't surprise me if all this is covered (and probably negated) in some terms and conditions somewhere, which we would have found equally hard to understand, probably.

My own feedback from UK consumerdirect was:


In reference to your enquiry, I would be grateful if you could confirm whether you have actually purchased the game. If you have, then you may have rights against the seller under the Sale of Goods Act 1979 (as amended), which requires that goods must be of satisfactory quality and fit for the purpose and as described. If you have encountered errors with the game, then the trader may be held in breach of contract and would be obliged to offer you a remedy of repair/replacement or full/partial refund depending on individual circumstances.

If this is the case, I would advise that you write a formal letter to the seller to inform them of the fault, sending the letter by recorded delivery and keeping a copy for yourself, setting out your argument in law as outlined above. You should state that you are making ‘time of the essence’ and request that they provide a repair or replacement at no added cost and within 7 working days.

This relates to the faults in the game. There was no mention of the adverts, although I did explain that side of things. I could have asked for further help but this seems a standard enough response that I think this non-standard situation would be beyond their scope.

Quite what there is to be gained from it I don't quite know. Judging from the way things are, I suspect no-one who can reverse the decision will care. I don't think there's any way to really get the adverts withdrawn. I hope they will die naturally after a while. Maybe the fact that most are only ever seeing one ad, and that some haven't had any in a while means they're already dying. For me, I'd rather have a fully working game now. That's what I paid for and is what I used to have (at least something much closer to it). But that won't happen either. If people want their money back then the whole 'fit for purpose' argument seems to be standard. I don't know how long it counts after purchase though, and the whole internet angle makes it far too hard to know what's what.

[abukii]

BUT...by accepting the terms and service of the (new/old) Terms, you agree to this by default, or else you dont play online. What your reading is to [directly] deal with sharing info on the "terminal", regardless of device youre actually using. The above has nothing to do with straming ads...its about sharing info that is otherwise confidential.

Im tellin ya, mang.

[SaturnReturn]

That doesn't make sense. If it has nothing to do with the adverts then how can I have accepted it all in the terms and conditions? Maybe I misunderstand. I don't doubt that you're right generally though. The chances are the Ts & Cs cover all the legal stuff.

Anyway, I'm not going to speculate on it any more because I'm not qualified. But I'm still not sure it doesn't relate to this at all, as it is linked with other directives which all relate to e-commerce etc. Some of those are probably relevant. (Did I say I'd stop speculating? OK, done now).

[mizunoori]

It seems germany is now ad-free (well, wipeout ad-free lol) . I didn´t do the fresh install, but the ads are gone....there are still wonders in this world. I hope the ads never come back.

[JJPAP]

Denmark free at last as well (for now) :P
(For the last one and a half week that is - based on the experience of an enormous amount of 2 wipers)

[Koleax]

They are COMING BACK.

Unless you take appropriate measures.

All it means is that no one has purchased ad space for this period of time. Or there are new holiday-themed ads on the way and they're not ready for release yet.

[mizunoori]

The ads are back... ¬_¬

Giving me 3 days without them to rise my hope...

[Koleax]

Did you read brummpahh's post? You know what method works in Germany. :nod And probably everywhere.

I declare no more whining about ads if you haven't done a fresh reinstall and made to sure to always start the game offline.

[DrMannevond]

I declare whining about the ads wouldn't be necessary if Sony showed some respect for their user base:)

[Constrictor]

Update on my ad situation. For about one week, after a two week absence, I did not see any ads. Even that I think the systems wants to display some - there is a very short stutter before the original loading screen appears. Did I change something? Well, no, besides that I did try the PSN-late-login method (and originally failed) and I stayed with this setting for manual login.

Assumption: Maybe they did change the ad roll from rocky and braveheart to something different. As I never was PSN-online when starting WOHD the new content never made it to my disk .. . Therefore no more ads - fingers crossed that they do not reactivate the existing ads that are stored locally and I do not f'up with the starting WOHD when PSN-online. So, maybe this is another indicator that the late-login method works - depending on the regional ad roll.

[mic-dk]

I haven't performed any of the voodoo to make the ads go away, but they have been gone for a few weeks now.

I'll enjoy it while it lasts!

[Oracol]

As someone who doesn't have the internet at home and bought HD in a videogame shop, I'm puzzled by this advertisement furore.

Do they pop up while the races load, or are they on the tracks, or what's the story with them?

[Skvall]

Its while races load, and it makes loadtimes worse.

But its not happening on every race.

[il_mago_di_Doz]

I've always used manual connection to psn. But only since 2 weeks ago I'm ad-free! This is such a good feeling... :P

[abukii]

I havent been playing that much lately, but I do cram a session in at least a few times a week. I havent had any ads at all. I do have auto log-on enabled because I use remote play often.

[RedScar]

So how is it that you all are getting around the adds? Signing into PSN after you load the game? I plan to boot up and finally patch so i wanna know.

[yeldar2097]

Dunno what the status is on this because afaik people haven't been getting ads for the last few weeks. Probs not gone for good but I dunno what's going on.
Maybe someone else knows? :)

[Dark_Phantom_89]

The ads are there yeldar :( I keep getting the Relentless one now - least it's better than that bloody annoying Fight Club one.

[Koleax]

So how is it that you all are getting around the adds? Signing into PSN after you load the game? I plan to boot up and finally patch so i wanna know.

Yes. Immediately after you update, make sure to NEVER be online while you start the game and only go online after the intro sequence has completed, or else it will download ads and save them to your disk.

[AG-wolf]

for all the BS and commotion about them, I have ironically never seen one yet since I've been able to play online during my winter break from school.

I feel like I might be pushing my luck by posting about it, and I've probably jinxed myself now :P But really, should I have seen one by this point or do they not show up in US consoles?


...(Knock on wood)

[Amorbis]

I still get the occasional advert. The most frequent being an advert for some deodorant/energy drink that I can quite see properly so I can't actually tell what it is. The logo is also quite small and intricate so I don't even know what brand it is.

I haven't played WipEout since last week so I don't know if it's still there, though. There did seem to be less adverts which was good, but I can't say anything for certain.

[Rezatron]

I'm in Canada and have only seen one ad. It was a trailer for the movie "Armored." I started seeing it around the middle of November right up until it hit theaters Dec 2, now nothing. I presume Sony hasn't been able to secure anymore advertising deals, rather than simply deciding to pull the ads.

Frankly I question the effectiveness of such advertising, after seeing that trailer 50+ times the last thing I wanted to do was go see the movie.

[stin]

Yes, we do get adverts occasionally.

Amorbis, It`s Relentless, an energy drink.;)

stevie:)

[yeldar2097]

I haven't started WO whilst being signed in since about 2 weeks after the ads were introduced.
I dunno if ads would still be there if I signed in before starting WO, not really willing to risk it though :P

:g

[stin]

Yelder, ads will be there no matter what you do!;)

stevie:)

[eLhabib]

Seems I'm just a lucky guy then - I haven't seen a single ad yet! :D

[O_BR]

There were some PSP adverts like a month ago but since then I haven't seen any.

[PSMuF]

I used to get the same one over and over again at every race I did online at some point, but recently I've hardly seen any. They finally stopped talking about fight club, yay!

[JJPAP]

Like O_BR said, in Scandinavia there haven´t been a single advert for the last month or so :P
I guess we owe our luck to Doctor Mannevond :+ :rock :lol

[jan709]

the netherlands (utrecht at least :P) are now two days ad free :hyper

[Lance]

Since the advert discussion thread already existed, I appended AG-Wolf's new advert thread, started today, to the earlier thread. A redirect has been left for two days.

[il_mago_di_Doz]

Here in Italy we are ad-free since a month ago too ;)

[DrMannevond]

@JJPAP : Hell Yeah! Power to the People:rock
:lol
But I highly doubt it. I got a written reply (a real letter on paper:eek) today from the norwegian consumer protection agency. There's no law preventing Sony from spamming my games with ads as long as they comply with the marketing law of norway.:brickwall

[TorquedSoul]

I haven't seen any ads for about three to four weeks. Has Sony stopped showing them for good?

[Koleax]

I don't know, probably not. I thought maybe after New Year's there'd be new contracts starting, but it looks like that is not the case.

It is possible they recognized how asinine they were being. Or the advertisers don't think the cost is worth it. Or both? The latter may have caused the former.

I'm dreaming. There'll be ads soon. A few people work in the advertising industry here. It can be very unpredictable, right?

[DrMannevond]

Haven't seen an ad since november now. Have they really stopped doing it? If that's the case, can I please have another patch to remove all the ad-serving crap that was bolted on top of my beautiful game?:P

[Dan Locke]

Heh, I never had any ads, except for the Fury expansion pack. And that was for a month, before I got the pack for Christmas, after which they went away.

[ACE-FLO]

Not had any either, for a while now... but I kinda miss the annoying Rocky advert, don't hate me - its true! :lol

[ProblemSolver]

Two month ago I had ads in the game, but from my online session last week and
yesterday I can say that there aren't any ads anymore, at least for me. If the
game stays that way I may consider to play more often.

[Aeroracer]

imagine how rubbish it would be if they put commercial breaks into wipeout..

you halfway through a race and suddenly the game freezes for everyone and you gotta sit there to watch loads of adds then the game resumes..


sound bad.but adverts in loading time imo is only one step behind this becoming a reality.

tbo its all about cash if a game makes more money by wrecking it with adverts than from keeping it pure they will always go for the adverts.company need money happy fans wont feed your family as well as a fat check from the advert company.
they will basically push fans as much as possible to get their prfits as high as possible.

hopefully i am just being negative and i am completly wrong..but i dont think soo.:nod

[Dan Locke]

You are indeed completely wrong. Nobody would buy a game that interrupted them with commercial breaks - heck, people even avoid free games with intrusive advertizing. A "fat check from the advert company" wouldn't begin to cover a loss like that.

[Aeroracer]

its so good to be wrong on things like that.

[ProblemSolver]

You might not be that wrong, jade, since 'nobody' ever thought it would happen to TV.
At a given point in time gaming will become like 'TV', either you pay or you have to deal
with all the **** flying straight into your face.

[Dan Locke]

And since we pay for the game, we don't have ads.

Did the home video release of a movie or TV show ever have commercial breaks?

[ProblemSolver]

@Dan Locke:
So I payed for WipEout HD, I got ads. What now? Old-school home videos are a
different thing. Putting ads into them wouldn't make much sense, since they
would become out-dated pretty soon. But when you have an internet connection
attached, things will be different. And looking at the Blu-Ray 2.0 standard, which
assumes that every player has an LAN port, the idea of interrupting home
videos with advertisement might become a reality, an annoying one.

[Dan Locke]

>So I payed for WipEout HD, I got ads. What now?

After the huge backlash from people who paid for the game and got ads anyway, Sony got rid of them. You should be proud of your victory.

Believe it or not, Sony doesn't actually exist for the sole purpose of screwing people over.

[ProblemSolver]

So you followed all the discussions against the ads? Good.
I wouldn't say victory, but somethings along these lines may fit.

Btw; I'm not against Sony, quite the contrary is true. Xbox sux. http://www.consolewars.de/messageboard/images/smilies/SC31.png

[Lance]

You all may recall that Sony has twice tried these adverts and just because they stopped a second time does not mean that they will not try a third or a fourth or more.

[ProblemSolver]

I just thought about to write this as well. But I somehow think that Sony / SL 'are
done' with ads on WipEout HD. One thing is for sure, WipEout HD was kinda
acting as a guinea pig. We may probably see ads again in other games, games
that will be introduced having ads right from the start, which would be ok. But
the way it was done for WipEout HD was just (at best) terrible.

[Dan Locke]

You all may recall that Sony has twice tried these adverts and just because they stopped a second time does not mean that they will not try a third or a fourth or more.
So boycott the games. Get a 360 if you care that much.

[Lance]

Problem Solver, I abandoned faith in desired fantasies quite a long time ago; I still enjoy fantasies, but I don't expect them to happen, since they pretty much never do, at least not in a manner that I would consider perfect for my individual preferences.

I suspect that Sony chose Wipeout to experiment on precisely because Wipeout fans are so much fewer in numbers and financial consequence than the highly popular franchises. It is always non-ruling minorities who suffer from mistreatment of various kinds. At least that has always been my experience as someone who is always in several minorities at the same time. So Wipeout may continue to suffer various indignities and negative attention.

----

'Dan Locke', I already have a 360. I do not have a PS3.

[Koleax]

I fully expect the ads to return for the reason Lance stated and because there has been no public statement about backtracking on ads. Everyone had already assumed SL learned something from the State Farm debacle but that was not the case. When the ads return, there may be some public statement along the lines of, "we listened to our customers and the ads are back and better than ever." One of the complaints were that the ads were repetitive, so perhaps they are waiting until they have a lot of different ads to run at once.

Believe it.

[Dan Locke]

I'm very skeptical of your conclusions. Even if ads do become a permanent fixture in Wipeout HD (unlikely), why would they ever become widespread in the industry as a whole, especially in the form of actual commercial breaks? People wouldn't stand for it; there'd be an uproar.

People tolerate product placement in games because it doesn't interfere with the actual gameplay - in some games, it actually adds to the atmosphere. But the same guy who likes seeing the occasional billboard in his favorite skateboarding games would be pretty ticked-off if they actually interrupted his grinds and kickflips with commercials for the same products. As more games add it (again, highly unlikely), the number of ticked-off players grows, eventually reaching the point where you have a mob.

Nobody in the industry cares when a few soccer moms protest video game violence, because they aren't the people who buy games. If you have actual players raging about commercial breaks (and, believe me, they would), though, it's going to turn more than a few executive heads.

Oh, and regarding ProblemSolver's earlier comment that "nobody thought it would happen to TV": filmed commercials actually predate television (they were shown in cinemas before the main feature, just like they are today), and print ads predate filmed commercials (newspapers have had them since at least the 18th century). In reality, few people thought that it wouldn't happen.

[DrMannevond]

Nobody in the industry cares when a few soccer moms protest video game violence, because they aren't the people who buy games.

Technically I think they are. I believe the average gamer now is a thirty-something female. They're either buying it for their kids or for themselves.:D

And about commercial breaks in games, that is already happening to a certain degree in for instance Dragon Age. It's "cleverly" disguised as a random encounter when moving around the world-map, but you still have to sit through the loading screen, realize it's the same annoying in-game character pushing DLC, and then sit through even more loading going back to the map. So, basically, a forced break with only one purpose - selling something to you, the consumer.:brickwall

[Dan Locke]

Re: soccer moms

They aren't Rockstar's target demographic; they weren't going to buy Rockstar's games anyway, and Rockstar knew that the people who did buy their games (20-something guys) liked the violence. Hence my point.

As far as Dragon Age: Origins goes, that's pretty much the OPPOSITE of an intrusive commercial break. You don't have to talk to the character, and you can pretty much ignore him for the entire game. I suppose that he could have been left out of the game entirely, but, considering that he was advertizing an expansion for the game itself, I think that BioWare had the right to stick him in. It's not like they were forcibly interrupting the game to shill for Pepsi or Reebok.

[DrMannevond]

They aren't Rockstar's target demographic

No, but I'm pretty sure they're a large part of the demographic for the Sims, Farmville and World of Warcraft.

As for Dragon Age, that's the problem - you can't ignore the guy! He's a random encounter on parts of the world map, which means you might bump into him at any time while moving between locations, forcing you to load the encounter (for the nth time), and then load the world map again, and then load your original destination. That gets old very fast, especially since they have a perfectly fine online store in the game that you can ignore.

But back on topic, as long as the ads in WO are gone I'm :hyper, and I would be even more :hyper if SL could somehow un-patch the whole ad-serving code.:nod

[KGB]

Just seen a new advert for Percy Jackson and the lightning thief, You little tinkers Sony :naughty

[Koleax]

Who wants to say, "I told you so?"

Me.

[KGB]

Am I the only one who has had adverts today, thought this thread would be boiling over by now.

[yeldar2097]

Most of us boot the game without being signed in nowadays ;)


...or it could be just me all on my lonesome, who knows :P

[Dark-Twisted]

I think it has something to do with my low New Zealand internet speed, but I have NEVER seen one of the adverts in WipEout. I always play it signed in.

Lucky me?

[AG-wolf]

yeah, after all this furor about the ads, myself included, I haven't seen a single one thus far any time I've been connected... I'm not complaining, mind you lol :P

[Constrictor]

No, no, no ads here - still :clap Don't you dare, Sony!

btw, yeldar, you're not alone

[Aeroracer]

i played wipeout for the first time in a long time and i have been getting harry potter adverts which slow down my loading times.
I thought adverts were gone but obviously i was wrong.

so after all this time i can conclusivley say that sony/sl or both really dont give a hoot about their fans and if they can get away with it even if its imoral or perhaps illegal they will.its not like this has been a highly debated subject.no one has supported these adverts as a good thing.

putting adverts in a game thats already paid for is wrong and illegal in any ones eyes as much as buying a car and a year later when you wake up and go to drive it you find someone came around the night before and painted an advert on your bonnet.

whats really funny is these adverts i see are new ones .someone has updated the adverts yet the game still has faults fans have reported since the dawn of time.

so there ends my bitchy angry tantrum post. :guitar

[SaturnReturn]

I'm getting adverts for some film - looks like the replacement for Harry Potter as a movie franchise. The worst news is, this is in purely offline modes, and I haven't even signed in this session since I turned the PS3 on. They started the other day. I may have made the mistake of being online when starting the game, I'm not too sure. I assumed at the time that I had as I got ads when online, but seeing as I'm now getting them while I'm totally offline, I'm not so sure. When considered with the other recent news, this is a real kick in the nuts.

[brummpahh]

reinstall. don't buy "so nie" again, if possible.
in german language "s*n*" means:
"this way...doesn't work"
4real ;)

[TorquedSoul]

Funny that this thread should pop up again in the midst of Studio Liverpool's demise.

To me ... the in game advertising was a way to make some games which have a small but loyal (and active online) fan base more profitable. I accept advertising as a part of the new game model ... so long as it doesn't create massive wait times it shouldn't be a problem. But some money has to procured to pay for online servers, it doesn't just materialize out of thin air. And a game like wipeout, that has a relatively small fan base, should expect advertising to subsidize the online environment.

I'm not saying that fan base rebelling against online advertising killed SL ... but it certainly didn't help.

[IH8YOU]

I would have paid 3 times the price for Wipeout HD - and was prepared to. I think a lot of people were as well. That super cheap price didn't help things. The zero marketing / advertising of the game itself didn't help, either.

Finally - I understand running servers and maintaining networks costs $ - instead of patching the game to support ads with a sudden surprise - Sony should have offered an option to those of us who detest ads to pay an annual server / network fee.

Sh!t, for 20 dollars - I'd buy the game new every year and not bat an eyelash at the prospect. I think I said this before - way back when SL was still breathing....

Sigh... sadly I'm only a consumer - what would I know about what I want? - Just ask Sony - they know EXACTLY what I want. :rolleyes:

[TorquedSoul]

Subscription based gaming on consoles isn't far off either. No need to pay MS or Sony ... you will pay the game manufacturer directly just like many already do for MMO's on PCs.

Sony should definitely start looking into this type of arrangement for games that have difficulty being profitable under the current model.

[Koleax]

I'd rather have no Wipeout than one with annoying repetitive television-style ads that appear in load screens. Really, there is a way to do advertising right and that's nearly the worst they could have done. Good riddance to that.

$19.95... unbelievable. How much money do you guys want to guess they lost simply because they set the price too low? I would not be surprised if it was more than $100,000, and that's on the original WHD release alone.

Goodness knows how much they lost on Fury. With so many new game modes, I feel like I've only scratched the surface and will be playing this for a long time to come.

I'm a young person who majored in economics and I'm interested in these sorts of calculations. If anyone from Studio Liverpool would like to educate my curious and possibly naive mind confidentially, to see what sort of reasoning went into that pricing decision, I'd love that, but god I know you left a lot of money on the table.

[boxman22]

Funny that this thread should pop up again in the midst of Studio Liverpool's demise.

To me ... the in game advertising was a way to make some games which have a small but loyal (and active online) fan base more profitable. I accept advertising as a part of the new game model ... so long as it doesn't create massive wait times it shouldn't be a problem. But some money has to procured to pay for online servers, it doesn't just materialize out of thin air. And a game like wipeout, that has a relatively small fan base, should expect advertising to subsidize the online environment.

I'm not saying that fan base rebelling against online advertising killed SL ... but it certainly didn't help.
My problem with the ads was not the loading times. Here we had 3 ads being played over and over again for months. Not only that, but the sound volume was higher than rest of the game as well, which meant that i had to adjust down the volume on my headphones.

Also i would have accepted it more if it was sold with these ads. I didnt expect they would suddenly ad in game ads to a ad free game that i paid for. I would however accept it more if i knew it would lead to future releases or expansions.

[TorquedSoul]

regarding the pricing ... I think the intent was to have a kind of short term beta DLC model where every year they were introducing new tracks, modes and ships. Eventually once they sorted out the entire online experience a blu-ray version of the game would be released with all the add-ons included. I get the feeling that it got cut short. There was plenty of room for new tracks and ships. And definitely room for improvement on the online console.

Maybe Sony is ready to cut wipEout HD/fury to a disk and start preparing the next version of the game ... although with a different development team (or maybe the same development team as a different company).

[Connavar]

I now feel sad that we complained so much about in-game ads, because we lost
a lot more than that now, now I wish we could get ads back and SL still alive.

[SaturnReturn]

They're still there Connavar, and I think they may have been all along for some people. Don't feel bad about it. I can't think the revenue would have made any significant difference anyway. IMO it was probably always more about testing this out on HD than earning revenue from it.