Advergaming, Music & The Urbz

I found a handful of gaming stories and decided to lump them together in a mish mosh post. The first two deal with advergaming — PC World reports on the new in-game network being launched by Massive Inc. and InGamePartners that will "soon be plugging dynamic real-time ads into both online games and games connected to the Internet through Microsoft Xbox, Sony PlayStation 2, and Nintendo GameCube consoles." The placements are supposed to blend in with the games - i.e. no Starbucks on the Star Wars planet Tatooine. Consumer reaction is mixed…we'll see what happens. The other story is a commentary from Sean Carton at ClickZ who argues advergaming is where the Web was eight years ago — meaning the industry is still figuring it out.

The New York Times (registration required) writes about how Steve Schnur at EA (and who spoke at What Teens Want) is making the gaming industry a big player in the music biz. Case in point is Snoop Dogg's version of the 1971 song "Riders on the Storm," which is making its debut on Need For Speed Underground 2, a video game from Electronic Arts (not on MTV).

And finally — Joystiq has a short review of the Urbz (Sims in the City) and says it's basically a popularity contest where the moral of the story is underneath the glitz and glam (the right clothes, the right lines, which you have to choose to get anywhere in the Urbz), we are all basically the same.

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