Nolan Bushnell on the rise of advertising and the casual game

by Brenda Holloway on Jul 8th 2008 4:00PM

Interviews, MMO industry, Free-to-play, Casual

Nolan Bushnell, who bootstrapped the entire video game industry with Computer Space, Pong and the Atari 2600, later went on to found Chuck E. Cheese and several other ventures, has the solution for expanding the size of the gaming market. Casual games, everywhere. And how to pay for them? 30 second ad spots -- commercials, just like the ones on television or before movies. And he can target these ads better than ever. Are ad-supported games the wave of the future? In your MMO of choice five years from now, will a shampoo ad run whenever you ding? And by then, will you even mind? Gamasutra interviews Nolan Bushnell about casual games, targeted advertising, and the death of the hardcore gamer.

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Tags: advertising, atari, casual, chuck-e-cheese, computer-space, free-to-play, gamasutra, interview, mmo-industry, nolan-bushnell, pong, uwink

Reader Comments (1)

Commercials ask the same things of the audience as do television and movies: sit, watch, listen, and absorb.

But playing a game is generally not passive (especially MMOs, which are usually light on hands-off cut-scenes and linear dialog), and so traditional commercials are disruptive. More interactive marketing should be developed for games, such as ads that are themselves mini-games with rewards, quizzes/ratings/reviews, and itemized product placement.