So, Take-Two has now sold their soul to the advertising devil. They have penned a deal with Double Fusion, notorious in-game advertising firm. The two have agreed to a multi-title deal that could include as many as nine for the sale of in-game advertising. Essentially, the deal makes Double Fusion the in-game advertising firm for all of 2K's North American and European releases in 2007 and 2008. The deal includes all platforms and PC, except Xbox and the Xbox 360.

"Our titles offer a range of advertising and marketing possibilities for leading and niche brands, so working with a company that can effectively sell both dynamic and integrated opportunities was key to our decision. Double Fusion's sales team immediately provides 2K with the advertising agency connections on Madison Avenue and the scale necessary to tap into the opportunities inherent in many of our games." - Steve Glickstein, 2K's Vice President of Sales and Licensing
The deal will include static and dynamic placement for ads within the content. This means the dynamic ads will utilize your Internet bandwidth to send you updated, ever-changing commercials in your games. Is this really what we want, or is it time to raise our collective gamer voices, and say, "Enough"?

We've already seen video game juggernaut, Electronic Arts, go this way, and personally I'm pissed off. There is something to be said for advertising in games offering a bit of realism, but at what point is it too much? And if I am to suffer the onslaught of these companies flinging their logo feces at me, shouldn't I receive some compensation? If a game offers in-game adverting, especially dynamic content that utilizes the Internet bandwidth that I pay for, I need a kickback.

With the introduction of the first next-gen games, and the accompanying 20% price hike, there was some justification of this cost increase. Proponents argued there had not truly been a price increase since the introduction of the home gaming console, and they were correct. I remember Space Invaders on the Atari 2600 priced to move at $50 a cartridge. But games have long survived at this rate, and although a price hike was probably justified, I think a price drop is now in order to offset the attack of the advertisers.

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