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Major XBOX 360 ad to run during LOST tonight.

I'm sorry, but that was a TERRIBLE ad.

It looked wonderful and was stylish, but it was not memorable on its own and had ZERO linkage to Xbox 360. If it's aimed at "casual gamers" but doesn't provide any indication that it's selling a gaming product, what's the point?

StoOgE mentioned iPod ads as being another example of this kind of indirect advertising, but I would totally disagree. Yes, the ads don't talk about the capabilities of an iPod, but the silhouettes are rocking out to MUSIC, so it's tied to the device's function. What's the takeaway from this ad -- that you're supposed to throw water balloons at your Xbox 360?

However, my frothing anticipation for a water balloon simulation using the Revolution controller grows!
 
Stinkles said:
Anyway, I am calling my bookie right now to bet significant sums of money on this NOT being H3 related.
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:( :(

Stinkles with the 1 shot kill.

p.s you didnt show for the GAF halo party last night. (tsk tsk)
 
Nutter said:
:( :(

Stinkles with the 1 shot kill.

p.s you didnt show for the GAF halo party last night. (tsk tsk)
Click to expand...


I was waiting for my invite from DopeyFish, on account of my real gamertag being a dead giveaway.
 
Stfu haters. That ad did its job. Every time I see a water baloon, Ill think of the Xbox 360....













.










's shitty AD
 
I work in advertising. I am an Art Director. This commercial is very inaffective. I understand what MS is trying to convey with the water balloons and all. But this could be applied to the original xbox. There is nothing there to motivate the consumer to basically trash their xbox and get the upgraded model. The idea that MS should convey is that the 360 will take them beyond what they have experienced with the xbox. More realism, connectivity, variety. Instead they are trying to be artsy. That works with some products but in this instance no.

A commercial needs to captivate you. Sure you don't always need to show the product. But in the case of videogames or any visual electronic device, it is important to show the product and what the product can do. I am not saying they should just a bunch of clips of games, but they should show something to wet the appetite of the buyer.

That commerical did not do it.
 
Beowolf said:
I work in advertising. I am an Art Director. This commercial is very inaffective.
Click to expand...

If you're in advertising (not saying you're not), you should know how to spell that word correctly...

ineffective


Note: this isn't an attack, just wanted to let you know, because that is probably a highly used word in your line of work. Got to help my GAF brothers out. :D
 
shpankey said:
If you're in advertising (not saying you're not), you should know how to spell that word correctly...

ineffective


Note: this isn't an attack, just wanted to let you know, because that is probably a highly used word in your line of work. Got to help my GAF brothers out. :D
Click to expand...


Art Directors can't spell. This is a truism. Their brains is full of art.
 
To those who loved the ad and thought it did what it set out to do...

There were two people in front of my tv last night. There was me, and there was my wife.

I am a gamer through and through. I have not preordererd an Xbox 360, incidentally, and I am extremely wary of Microsoft's approach to next gen, but I will probably end up with one within the next two years. I watched and listened to the entire ad.

My wife is an extremely casual gamer. She doesn't often buy games, and every once in a while she'll develop an addiction to a game I bring in the house...any SSX game, the Sims, Diablo II, Animal Crossing. I can't think of a time when she's gotten into an Xbox game, but that might be more due to my buying habits than the console's offerings or image...I don't really know. I would describe her as the average female casual gamer who happens to live with a more serious gamer, and therefore ends up being pretty savvy just because I blab about my hobby a lot - point being, she's aware of the Xbox 360 but has no interest in it. She watched and listened to the first few seconds of the ad and then tuned out, clearly bored.

When the ad ended and the logo flashed on the screen, I said "what the fuck was that?" My wife looked up from the magazine she had opened. "Hmmm?" "That was an ad for the Xbox 360," I said. "Huh," she said, and went back to her magazine, unconcerned and uninterested.

So, in my household anyway, the serious gamer without a preorder was unimpressed and baffled. The casual gamer tuned out before the logo came on the screen, and after learning of the product, was simply unimpressed.

Yeah, this is anecdotal evidence, but I wouldn't be surprised if it happened to be the norm for homes like mine.
 
What I found interesting was right before the ad, it was clear that the kid who stormed into the hut had clearly been hit by a water balloon. I liked how MS linked Lost to their commercial.
 
Open Source said:
GAF says: 360 doomed because of bad commerical.
Click to expand...


GAFs is a fountain of wisdom, back to 2001 when they united once more and prophesized the doom of Xbox, the unfortunate machine was supposed to die soon after 12 months :lol
 
civilstrife said:
Um... If that's real, its definately a Halo 3 announcement. Highlight the image. The number 3 appears on the left hand side.
Click to expand...

I see a 3 too... without highlighting it.
 
I haven't seen the ad, I live in the UK but what you must remember that the TV ad is part of an overall package, campaign call it what you like. It starts from the bottom up, the bottom being the people from MS the Allards of this world who will want to push certain facets of the 360, namely online gaming in this case. This will be followed through with game developers who talk up there games actively pointing out its multiplayer options (yeah take Kameo out of this), Print adverts and finally the TV adverts. There will be more to come and eventually if done correctly the jigsaw pieces of the campaign join together to give an overall focus. You'd be suprised about what people remember from adverts and what they ignore.
 
I think it would be a good a ad a year or two into the 360's lifecycle. It screams "Hey, come join in on the fun!" But as a ad to announce to casual gamers a new gen is upon them, it does a pretty poor job.
 
I haven't seen the water ballon one, but the jump rope one they've been showing on Spike TV is pretty damn cool IMO.
 
echoshifting said:
To those who loved the ad and thought it did what it set out to do...

There were two people in front of my tv last night. There was me, and there was my wife.

I am a gamer through and through. I have not preordererd an Xbox 360, incidentally, and I am extremely wary of Microsoft's approach to next gen, but I will probably end up with one within the next two years. I watched and listened to the entire ad.

My wife is an extremely casual gamer. She doesn't often buy games, and every once in a while she'll develop an addiction to a game I bring in the house...any SSX game, the Sims, Diablo II, Animal Crossing. I can't think of a time when she's gotten into an Xbox game, but that might be more due to my buying habits than the console's offerings or image...I don't really know. I would describe her as the average female casual gamer who happens to live with a more serious gamer, and therefore ends up being pretty savvy just because I blab about my hobby a lot - point being, she's aware of the Xbox 360 but has no interest in it. She watched and listened to the first few seconds of the ad and then tuned out, clearly bored.

When the ad ended and the logo flashed on the screen, I said "what the fuck was that?" My wife looked up from the magazine she had opened. "Hmmm?" "That was an ad for the Xbox 360," I said. "Huh," she said, and went back to her magazine, unconcerned and uninterested.

So, in my household anyway, the serious gamer without a preorder was unimpressed and baffled. The casual gamer tuned out before the logo came on the screen, and after learning of the product, was simply unimpressed.

Yeah, this is anecdotal evidence, but I wouldn't be surprised if it happened to be the norm for homes like mine.
Click to expand...

Ding! Ding! Ding!

QFT

This is exactly what happened with me and my g/f last night while watchcing it. Same exact situation. The ad was so lame that you would tune out of it rather than wonder what it is. By the time they show the logo, a lot of people aren't even watching anymore. Terrible ad.
 
The problem with the ad is that it almost had absolutely nothing to do with the 360. Sure, it had people "playing together", but there's many products out there that do that. Throughout the whole thing, I had absolutely no idea what the product was. I had no idea it was a 360 commercial. At the end, when the logo showed up on screen, I looked at the person next to me, and said "I did not see that coming at all." Typically a commercial has some sort of specific tie to the product, but this one had nothing but the logo. Sure that could spark interest and curiosity, but that's no guarantee. From a marketing standpoint, it left people completely clueless as to what they were selling, which sort of makes it hard to sell something, doesn't it?

From a design standpoint, throwing out all of the marketing and selling stuff, the commercial was EXTREMELY well done. There's not a soul on earth who couldn't say that at some point in their life they'd absolutely LOVE to participate in a city wide water balloon fight. It's impossible. The appeal is unresistable. Even though the commercial didn't sell me in anyway at all on the 360, the commercial reminded me of that.
 
Just saw a jump rope commercial for the 360 during a NY Rangers hockey game here in the NYC area, so I guess they're breaking out the ads all over now. It was a good spot, too. It caught my attention without having any idea what the ad was for.
 
:lol I love the reactions here. I just saw the waterballoon commercial and I instantly thought of the Playstation commercials. Commercials I remember people here on GAF claiming to be "the best videogame ads EVAR"!

Corny "old-timey" song: CHECK
Grainy "artsy" video qualy: CHECK
Inner city setting: CHECK
Everyday people randomly breaking out into a massive game: CHECK

Didn't think the commercial was all that bad...Wouldn't sell me on the system if I didn't already know what was coming.
 
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