You obviously haven’t seen the ads for IMVU, the online virtual world for tween girls and their would-be pedophilic stalkers. I used to work there and I can’t even count the number of times a parent called to complain because they thought their 13yr old daughter was playing some innocent online dress-up-and-chat-with-friends game, but then happened to see one of the softcore ads floating around the Web.
These ads are relevant to my interests.
I took a peep on the “depressing” “submit pictures of yourself to become the queen of Evony” thread posted by Jeff above and uh… huh. Some of those young ladies were rather attractive.
http://bbs.evony.com/showthread.php?s=0959f2cdad18661272de2a0e89183e28&t=11313&page=3
The blonde in the white dress is also relevant to my interests.
This story just got picked up by gawker.com Jeff!
Apparently you tapped a vein.
“Remember, Yahoo Spades and Diner Dash are “online games” too…”
Yes, but they are in a completely different class than the game in question, so using a general, wide brushed “online gaming” shouldn’t be used when discussing this particular niche.
It’s a bit like saying “women are more into muscle cars than men because more women drive cars”. Yet, I can look at pretty much any car magazine and see a near naked women lying on the hood of a camero and easily determine that the statement is clearly false.
Ah, yes, the continuing evolution of the Idiocracy. Good post.
HAHAHAHAHA
That progression of ads is hilarious. The graph of blatant crass exploitation vs. time must look like a factorial.
Also: now that “Orange” is gone, witness the endless parade of pointless “captcha: _____” lines ending posts.
Sorry to say this but the ad worked on me.
- At first I thought what a stupid ad.
- But eventually I saw the ad so many times I went joined up as a free player.
- Irritating ads can work as they get a reaction.
Dammit Shawn, you win. Best comment on the page.
To the individuals who are shocked (or amused) by the fact that female gamers are offended by this: Really? What’s it like to be an idiot?
I mean, I find this progression of ads to be pretty hilarious, but only because they’re SO WRONG. An intelligent reaction to them–not so much.
I have seen that boob ad a million times in the past week and only just now did i learn what the ad was selling lol
Hundreds of girls in your area are hot, horny, and waiting to chat with YOU!
Brilliant post, as for the person who commented that when you are struggling you’ll resort to anything - well, maybe, but certainly not virtually incoherent,appallingly worded miss-spelled crap.
This reminds me somewhat of my puzzling over the gallery of foreign editions of the book “Freakonomics.”
http://freakonomicsbook.com/gallery/index.html
Each edition is slightly similar, translated and tailored to each country and language. But for some reason, the Turkish version just has a bikini chick on the cover.
I now picture Turkey as the embodiment of the Idiocracy.
Like real life when i see desperate woman showing cleavage I think of viruses.
Uhm, why did I get a popup that leads me to this game?
Here’s our take on their spam abuse and their new drastic action against their members (after we complained that day) : http://www.mmogrindhouse.com/game-news/bizarre/do-you-have-what-it-takes-to-be-the-next-spam-queen/
Hahahahahaha, I didn’t believe you at first (on that last image), until I SAW THIS (a new version):
Cheers
-Martín
I’m playing this other webgame for a while now which displays these Ebony ads and I noticed these transform into cheap blatent softcore pr0n as well.
It doesn’t really stimulate me to play the game though. In fact if that’s the kind of tactics they are using to get people to play the game, it makes you wonder what kind of gamers you’ll find in there.
Funny stuff though.
Great Article! Thanks for pointing it out. It annoyed the hell out of me as well.
You forgot one intermediate design of that ad, I think it completes the evolution:
http://www.gamedesignreviews.com/evony.jpg
Translation of Evony ads: “We are total sleazebags. Hand us your credit card!”