Damn... now that's using advertising and games as it should be used.

Wow, this is seriously really sweet. I guess it's not only "a" way around the whole "Piracy makes programmers loose FOOD", but one of the ones that'll really work in the long run.

Ads make money, money make stuff, stuff make people.

No wait!! PEOPLE make PEOPLE!

Anyhow, I'm sincerely looking forward to Jericho...

I honestly thought advertising would (at most) give a $10 to $20 dollar price-drop for a bucketload of it in a game. It seems that either
a) It costs a lot of money to put ads in these game
b) there are a truckload of ads in the games.

Either way this is quite amazing... extraordinary in fact.

However, Gametap is like US only, aight?

@Milzo: This isn't In-Game advertising. With the free Gametap you're required to watch ads while in the gametap interface, but not during actual gameplay. So you end up watching ads while downloading the game, and before you play it. It's the good old fashioned type of advertising that we're all used to and OK with.

@Harpa:
i think the free ad supported version is US only.

im dling gametap now!

I live on the wrong continent.

Ah well, I guess I go play a dota and waste more of my life.

Are you fucking kidding me?...I have both DiRT and Overlord. I want my 120$ back.

That's pritty cool, tho in jericho i can't see how they can intergrate advertising.

@Milzo:

I think what happened is that Codemasters did the math and came to the conclusion that the plugging away of game ads (with the added addition of more advertising revenue with products that are free because of a larger user base) combined with cheaper, non-retail based online distribution could potentially be just as profitable, if not more, than retail.

I think a new course in gaming history has been bestowed upon us, my friends!

Unless I moved continent, the ad-supported stuff is available globally. It's the subscription service thats US-only.

Sorry - I'd rather buy it.

Who the hell wants to play a horror game.....with commericials?

Seems ludicrous to me.

@Plunkett:
ah thanks for clearing that up.i get those 2 services mixed up.also you have just moved to a new continent during sleep check outside O_O

I wish in-game ads in console games made the game cost less.

These ads aren't in-game. They're all over the menus when you launch it. It's not like there's going to be giant Coke ads plastered all over the countryside in Overlord. Helps to check basic facts before going off on one.

Wow, cool..I'm sceptical, this is crazy..

Woahwoahwoahwoah

Isn't this yet another step towards TV and video gaming being distributed in exactly the same way?

Finally someone got the right idea!

Let advertisers pay for our games. Just like network TV. It's great to see this.

@Plunkett: You're right. Was going to mention this, but was busy gathering box of chocolates of Codematers... and a box of poison chocolates for EA.

I'm sorry, I lied. They were really little more then chocolate covered blowfish.

wow, so much headspinning because advertising in gaming is finally being used the way it should work and pretty much works in every other industry!? i don't think this is the point to stop bitching and moaning but the point to do so even louder in the direction of all the other publishers who place ads all the times but never give a single penny back to the consumer. funny thing it works for magazines, tv, cinema, radio, festivals and all kinds of stuff but producing games is aperantly the most intergalactic expensive thing in the world. it's so inconceivably expensive that all the money publishers are gathering from ads don't serve to cover it even a bit therefore we still need to pay those premium prices for next gen (oups) this gen games because otherwise there would be no way on earth anybody could produce those games. good thing we have microtransactions now cause otherwise we would all be forced to play nothing but hi-def iterations of tetris and galaga for the rest of our gaming lifes.

My only concern, although it might be unfounded, is advertisers going the way of commercial TV and radio and forcing censorship onto the media. I hope to hell we don't start getting "clean" versions of games if this 100% ad-supported trend takes off.

This is awesome. Now I'm gonna go out and reserve Fall of Liberty for my 360 so they can get more of the money Codemasters deserve.

So in fall of Liberty the Nazi's just ignore Russia? because that's the only way they could hope to take the US

I guess I'd be more excited if it wasn't rubbish games from Codemasters.

I reserve judgement until I see how the ads are integrated into/around the game and gameplay. The idea is sound and could work, like those old computers that game you free interent access with a large boarder of ads back in the day.

@Avinash_Tyagi: Nazis beat the shit out of everything in that game. Americas are the ones left out (mostly). That does bring up the point that if the United States knew of Nazi intent of controlling the world (they could've deduced), why is one of the biggest coastal cities completely unprepared for attack?

Still excited for the game though.

man, i'm checking this out. if this is as you say, this is a good use of advertising.

@WhoreofSpamylon:

I'd love to see the CF models. You're probably right, and if so, retail must be shaking in their boots. I'm sure B&Ms have been nervous for awhile about this method of distribution for other media. Given how the same advent sent shockwaves through the music industry, the term "revolution" seems fitting if gaming adopts the same means.

Wow. I've never used Gametap before, but I've been curious about Overlord. This may just convince me to sign up!

Do you have to pay a subscription fee a la Netflix or something?

This seems a lot like the divergence of television from a culture of film as occurred mid-century. Gone are the block-busters, which are in essence a mighty big bang-for-a-buck, in comes an ad-supported stream of free gaming content. Perhaps this will encourage the release of true episodic content, much like the soap operas of the gaming world. Though perhaps in the future, if this really gets off the ground, gamers may be forced to pay for a channel of premium content, hyped releases. Much like per-pay-view or cable.

Fascinating stuff.

^PAY-PER-view

@ach77:
they offer some free, but if you get a paid sub, you get a lot more games (including a lot of cool old retro stuff) with no advertising. its a good service.

oh and again, the advertising is not IN GAME, people. its like banner ads on a web page. theres no difference in game from the purchased version. codemasters does not do the ads, gametap does.

Amazing! I wonder if this will only be offered in certain countries (since some countries like AUS have very specific game anti-advert laws).

Now thaT'S WHAT'T i'M TALKIN bout. Finally ads in games doing what they're supposed to do.

Sounds pretty neat.

Although, as far as DiRT goes, it probably should be free from what I played of the demo. Looked damn nice though and the presentation was awesome. Too bad it all went straight to shite when it had to actually all move and control properly.

@Plunkett:

Mhh.. everything I see there requires a TapID. And obviously creating such an ID is restricted to USA & Canada. So I don't know which continent you're living in, but except if I'm completely missing something, it doesn't sound too "globally available" ^^

They're not available yet. In Fact the only game I could find in the list was Overlord, which isn't due until Augest 9th. I've never heard of these games, but I'll be looking forward to trying them out once they are released on Gametap

It seems you still have to pay for gametap to be able to download it.

I already have the Gametap client downloaded, but I've not used it in months.
My kid has been asking for Overlord since he saw me playing the demo on the 360. But Gamefly has been out of them since it was released (heck, they've been out of all the new games lately).

I don't want to plop down 60 bucks just so he can play it for a couple of hours and then leave it on the floor of his room so the cats can play with it. So this is the perfect solution. I'll download the Gametap client down to his computer after work and he can wait until next week to play it (which I'm sure will be months before Gamefly gets it back into stock).

Wow, if my PC can handle Overlord and Jericho I'll actually do this. I already know it can't handle DiRT very well sadly.

@yhancik:
The paid subscription service is US & Canada only. You can get a TapID and use the free service from anywhere (unless your country actually blocks it like China does with some stuff). There are no actual region blocks on Gametap. The US & Canada only restriction on the paid subscription service is only because of billing. If you have a valid US/Canadian credit card/billing address, you can also get the subscription service from anywhere.

This is incredibly cool. I've been on the fence about gametap, but this gives me a good reason to give it a whirl.

Judging from the gist of parts in this thread, I think Gametap still needs a bit more of a push to tell people that ads won't just pop up in their games.

Anyway, woot on Dirt and Overlord. Bonus woots for Jericho and Turning Point. I'd never have bought those two games without this.

@slacker164:
Well clicking on "get a Free TapID" keeps leading me to "We apologize but the GameTap service is currently only available in the United States and Canada. The GameTap service will be expanding into additional countries in 2007 but no release dates are available at this time."

Am I the only european here who gets this ? Is this because I'm in Belgium ? :|

It worked using a french proxy...

The only list of supported countries I found was for Uru Live... I guess it's the same :
Australia, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Spain, Sweden, the United Kingdom

I think we need to use a new word to describe this.
Sexcelent.

This news makes me a happy Havok.

Thank you Gametap and Codemasters. Now I need to look into new computer components. I haven't played anything other than casual games on my computer since Max Payne.

just looking at gametap, the free games are only free for a certain amount of time before it stops being free...
I don't know if these are the same way for the codemaster deal though, it cannot be free forever can it?
:)