Xbox’s Chief Strategist Clarifies Recent Comments About In-Game Ads as “More Affordable Alternatives”
We’ve talked a lot about the amazing changes that Xbox has made over the last few months. But one change that was suggested that raised some eyebrows was from Xbox’s new Chief Strategy Officer, Matthew Ball.
During a recent interview regarding Xbox’s plans to offer “more affordable alternatives” to consoles, Ball said there was a potential for ad support. However, he’s now clarifying his comment for those who had questions.
Ball pointed out that he just started his role at Xbox and is not stating the company’s plans nor beliefs, and that he did not mention any in-game advertising.
“What I do say is that ads should be used to offer more affordable alternatives alongside today’s ad-free experiences, in the hopes more could play as a result. Similar to how Netflix and Disney+ have ad-tiers with all the same content, but at half the price or so,” Ball clarified.
“At no point do I even mention in-game ads. I personally believe interrupting the gameplay experience would be bad.”
The original quote came up while speaking to The Game Business, where Ball went over the problems in modern gaming, saying that development cost is “way too high” and consumers don’t want to pay more, especially with the rising costs of consoles these days.
During this conversation, he cites streaming platforms as an example, saying that it could help find the solution to their problems. And since ad-based games are already popular on mobile, that could be something to think about.
“The question is not can we cram ads in everything. The question is, are there opportunities that allow the people who can’t afford, or wouldn’t try, to have an onboard to our properties and franchises?” he questioned.
Ball went on, asking, “How do we keep our products affordable? How do we make sure that we can continue to fund outstanding work from our development team? That’s the goal.”
“It’s not about placing an ad in front of someone so that we can sell, you know, a pizza.”
This isn’t the first time that Ball has brought up in-game ads, though, as he’s said that people should embrace it, so that it doesn’t get worse. “We don’t want layoffs, we don’t want fewer games, we don’t just want the same games… we don’t want price increases. The money needs to come in one way or another.”
While that’s true, the money does need to come from somewhere; it’s a shame to think we’re at the stage of gaming where we need to have ads on consoles. That shouldn’t be the answer. And along with that, if the ads aren’t interrupting our gaming time, when would we see them? During load screens? At the bottom or top of the screen, constantly? On the home page?
As disappointing as this sounds, this might very well be the future in order to keep the costs of consoles from skyrocketing due to the component shortage.
