Microsoftis making the most of its acquisition ofActivision Blizzard, asXboxusers are greeted with an unavoidable, full-screenCall of Dutyad as soon as they boot up their consoles. This is being met with overwhelming frustration from fans, who hope this kind of advertising isn’t a new tactic from Xbox, trying to get us to part with our money before we’re at the homepage.
The ad, which encourages you to pick up one of the special editions forCall of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, is a first for Xbox. Typically, ads and promoted games are limited to the Xbox storefront. With this in mind, Xbox owners are fearful that we’ll start to see more ads before we’ve even had a chance to boot up a game.
As discussed in theXbox subreddit, it seems that the ad is appearing regardless of the user’s prior interest - or lack thereof - in the Call of Duty series. Considering this, it certainly seems like this is a bid from Xbox to boost Modern Warfare 3 sales on its platform, now that it owns Activision Blizzard.
Thankfully, the ad is perfectly skippable, as you just have to click the exit option on the right. Still, the fact that the ad is here in the first place has attracted much ire.
Xbox owns Activision Blizzard now, but it doesn’t have exclusivity for the Call of Duty series.These games will continue to launch on PlayStation for at least ten years. Microsoftalso made a similar deal with Nintendo.
Xbox hasn’t responded to the overwhelmingly negative feedback just yet, so it’s not clear if this is just a new advertising method from the company. If so, fans certainly won’t be pleased, as advertising in gaming remains a contentious topic.
In recent years, it’s become increasingly difficult to dodge ads, even when you’ve already booted up your game. As we reported in May,Mortal Kombat 11 was overrun with ads for Hogwarts Legacy. This was particularly odd, given that the games couldn’t be further apart in terms of tone, gameplay, and their target audience. Still, Hogwarts Legacy was unavoidable while playing Mortal Kombat 11, as the first thing you were greeted with was a link to take you to the store to buy the game. Even after hitting exit, the main menu would have a Hogwarts Legacy banner ad, further convincing you to pick it up. Keeping in mind, Mortal Kombat 11 was the most recent game in the series at the time, and was still being sold at full price - hardly the kind of game you’d expect to be full of ads.
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