Here in the US, race car drivers were a bit surprised over the weekend to spot trackside billboards with the Presidential contender's face on them and the message "Early Voting Has Begun. VoteForChange.com." OK, this wasn't on an actual track, these were virtual billboards, on imaginary roads, driven by Xbox 360 players in an online version of the popular racing video game "Burnout Paradise."
Game maker Electronic Arts confirmed Monday that the Obama campaign ads were the real deal. "Like most TV, radio and print outlets, we accept advertising from credible political candidates," an EA spokeshack told the tech blog GigaOm. "Like political spots on the television networks, these ads do not reflect the political policies of EA or the opinions of its development teams."
As you can imagine, most gamers were less than thrilled about this...
"The McCain campaign will respond by buying ads at Pong consoles nationwide," joked one. "You can't even PAY for a video game without being pummeled with ads," complained another.
At least, gamers only have three weeks of this bullshit to look forward to. Political ads on TV have been almost non-stop for the last two years.
George Parker
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