In Third Person

In 2011, no video game trailer made more waves or garnered as much attention as the Dead Island announcement trailer. As far as video game trailers go, this haunting and beautiful piece is one of the best video game trailers ever made. Thanks to this trailer, the game built up a tremendous amount of pre-release buzz and ultimately sold really well.

Say what you will about the quality of the trailer, but the Dead Island announcement trailer captures a lot of what I hate about video game marketing and advertising. I’ll take this a step even further and say that due to the business practices behind the creation of most video game trailers and commercials, I actively avoid watching them.

Why am I made at Dead Island? Or more appropriately, why am I mad about video game trailers and commercials? I am mad because most video game trailers and commercials are misleading; more so than most products and services advertised. The two most common ways that advertisers and marketers try and mislead us is by twisting how the game looks and what the game is about.

Let’s start with graphics, cause this is the easiest place to start. Most video game trailers make heavy use of CG graphics in order to make their games look better than they actually do. I understand why advertisers and marketers go this route, as the end result looks better and it’s easier to make something CG that evokes the direction of the game if you have to advertise before the game is ready to be shown. However, there are countless video game trailers that feature 0 in-game footage. The most heinous example of this was the Call of Duty 2 commercial (see above) that tries really hard to make you think that the game actually looks like that. This commercial was actually banned in the UK and other parts of the world for being misleading. Even games with awesome in-game graphics sadly take this route as well, such as Batman: Arkham City and the upcoming Assassin’s Creed: Revelations. I wouldn’t consider myself to be picky about graphics, but I know enough about video games to see right through the CG facade. If your video game trailer doesn’t feature any in-game footage, then it’s not worth my time.

The other way advertisers and marketers try and mislead us is by not painting an accurate picture of what the game is about. Going back to Dead Island, that trailer makes it look like the game carries a lot of emotional weight. When you actually play the game, you’ll realize very quickly that whatever emotional weight that trailer had is nowhere to be found in the final product. The original Gears of War is guilty of the same crime, as the Mad World trailer also spun the game as having more emotional weight than the final product ultimately had.

As much as I ultimately ended up loving Catherine, the trailers for that game were as misleading as they come. Up until close to the game’s release, Atlus didn’t show any actual gameplay in its trailers. It wasn’t until very late in Atlus’ marketing cycle when they finally revealed that Catherine was actually a puzzle game. Before those gameplay trailers finally hit, I thought it was some perverse dating simulator. On the flipside, I’m certain that Catherine sold a lot better thanks to the advertising focus being placed solely on the sex appeal rather the unsexy-by-comparison block puzzles.

Say what I will about the approach taken to advertise and market these games, I don’t see these practices changing anytime soon. Their current system works too well in terms of selling games for them to change. For every person like me, who is as skeptical as can be until they see actual gameplay footage, there are thousands of others who will make a purchasing decision based on the trailer alone.

What about video game trailers? Do you enjoy them? Do you dislike them as much as me? How much do you think they impact your purchasing decisions? Let’s discuss in the comments!