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Fake Mobile Game Ads

Kalentan

Kalentan

Member
Oct 25, 2017
46,953
You might be thinking I'm talking about those ads that clearly use stuff from other games... And that is part of this but I've noticed this trend recently of games using full CG videos masked as "gameplay" to advertise their mobile game that looks NOTHING like what they're selling.

One example I've seen over and over again is the game, Guns of Glory, they're these full 3d animations with UI elements that make things seem kind of interesting and slick but then you look at gameplay and it's well... Not any of that.



Versus what it actually looks like:

guns-of-glory-6.jpg:l


And it feels like a lot of them have the same people making them since they always have some action scene where they're fighting tons of enemies.

It's been a thing for awhile but lately I've seen more and so it's bothering more.

I found this YT channel that has a ton of videos just doing comparisons between the ads and the games.



Guessing others have seen these?
 
Vintage

Vintage

Member
Oct 27, 2017
1,342
Europe
Mobile gaming space is a fucking wild west. Because of low expectations, nobody cares what's there and you can get away with shit that you wouldn't even imagine anywhere else.

On topic, how does that Game of Thrones game that's advertised to insanity actually looks like?
 
Castor Archer

Castor Archer

Member
Jan 8, 2019
2,426
I saw a YouTube ad before a video for some game that had stolen Mario Maker footage. I wonder how that stuff first gets out there and second stays out there. It was before a fairly popular youtuber's video.
 

Deleted member 36578

Dec 21, 2017
26,561
It's crazy all this false advertising is allowed.
 
Agni Kai

Agni Kai

Member
Nov 2, 2017
8,302
Why is Leomon fighting Ogremon in the first game? That's plagiarism right there I tell you.

EDIT: Well, I kept watching and most of these are just plain asset flips.
 
Grettir_the_Swole

Grettir_the_Swole

Member
Nov 1, 2017
1,358
FL, United States
I mean, Clash of Clans comes to mind just because I found the art design, advertising, gameplay, and just about everything else about the game to be totally offensive to the senses but Evony was one of the early bs advertising campaigns I remember.
 
Pororoka

Pororoka

Member
Nov 1, 2017
1,210
MX
Kalentan said:
Wait a second. That screenshot, the UI... It's the same thing as the Guns of Glory. Same people.
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You are right! The UI looks the same.
Also a lot of freemium games, even if the developers are different, they are very similar. Makes me think that there is a game engine that it's a pre-made rpg game and you just asset-flip everything.
yxE2HM1.png
 
Soupman Prime

Soupman Prime

The Fallen
Nov 8, 2017
8,952
Boston, MA
All over the place. Some games look a lil interesting if that's what they were but then again they're so simple I doubt they'd be able to make a game that's 10+ levels.
It's crazy it's allowed because none of them look like what they're showing.
 
Jarrod38

Jarrod38

Member
Oct 25, 2017
13,651
Was really looking forward to Save the Princes game because of the ad but damn was I disappointed on seeing the real game.
 

Deleted member 12317

Account closed at user request
Banned
Oct 27, 2017
2,134
That's just like some games' covers or promotional pictures, it's beautiful, in 3D and all, but the game is just an (ugly sometimes) pixel art.
 
TheChrisGlass

TheChrisGlass

Member
Oct 25, 2017
5,666
Los Angeles, CA
It's a race to the bottom and shows what happens when the companies are all fighting with each other.

It increases click-through and installs for these games, because these videos are more intriguing, but it actually hurts long term retention because people quickly realize they've been cheated.

But by that point, the problem is on the game developers not the advertising company, because they don't see the correlation between retention and these deceitful ads.

I fucking despise these.
 
Isilia

Isilia

Member
Mar 11, 2019
6,186
US: PA
When I can get back to my PC, I had screenshot a game on facebook that was just plain torture porn (girl chained up, spread out, with spikes about to fall into her privates who you had to save in time). They since took down those ads, but the game apparently still is nothing like they portrayed it.

(Actually ToS may not let me post it, so I will avoid posting it)
 
Santerestil

Santerestil

The Fallen
Oct 28, 2017
2,372
Games like Gardenscape (that's a match 3) have a lot of non-interactve fake QTE ads where a character must escape a dangerous situation and the player must choose an object to continue the story.
 
Firebrand

Firebrand

Member
Oct 25, 2017
4,829
Vintage said:
Mobile gaming space is a fucking wild west. Because of low expectations, nobody cares what's there and you can get away with shit that you wouldn't even imagine anywhere else.

On topic, how does that Game of Thrones game that's advertised to insanity actually looks like?
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Jesus, those Reddit ads by numbered accounts bug the hell out of me. They're barely in coherent English. "I make level-up all the night" or something along those lines. Are they really officially licensed? I admit I did chuckle at the "rewrite history" one.
 
Cantaim

Cantaim

Member
Oct 25, 2017
34,102
The Stussining
Honestly there's a lot of bad ads out there. But it was all kinda worth if for the giant mafia city compilations. Bonus points if you recognize some of the stuff they stole that was very explicit with it's "do not use for commercial purposes" guideline of use
 
hey it's that dog

hey it's that dog

Member
Oct 25, 2017
9,256
My kid has gotten very obsessed with Peggle Blast and Cookie Cats Pop and when we play together I see all these ads but I didn't know how completely unrelated to the actual games they could be. Sometimes I see an ad showing a kind of simple puzzle kind of thing and think "oh he might like this" but the actual game is a fucking gardening simulator or something.
 
HaremKing

HaremKing

Banned
Dec 20, 2018
2,416
They may call that Guns and Glory, but damn does it sure look like Evony to me... and that has to be like 10-15 years old at least by now.
 
Dinjoralo

Dinjoralo

Member
Oct 25, 2017
10,398
One thing that confuses me is a lot of the ads within mobile games, for other mobile games, usually super cheap looking ones. I have to wonder if those games actually make a lot of money, but they probably do, sadly.
Einbroch said:


Oh wait, it really does look that good.
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I mean, actually good mobile games will likely have pretty representative ads. A lot of the ones that are so blatant are usually shovelware.
I guess while I'm here, I might as well post another example of a good ad.
 
OP
OP
Kalentan

Kalentan

Member
Oct 25, 2017
46,953
Dinjoralo said:
One thing that confuses me is a lot of the ads within mobile games, for other mobile games, usually super cheap looking ones. I have to wonder if those games actually make a lot of money, but they probably do, sadly.

I mean, actually good mobile games will likely have pretty representative ads. A lot of the ones that are so blatant are usually shovelware.
I guess while I'm here, I might as well post another example of a good ad.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...


TBH I feel like Mobius FF is really underrated. Played it since I got my iPad and never spent a dime.
 
RoaminRonin

RoaminRonin

Member
Nov 6, 2017
6,164
Dinjoralo said:
One thing that confuses me is a lot of the ads within mobile games, for other mobile games, usually super cheap looking ones. I have to wonder if those games actually make a lot of money, but they probably do, sadly.

I mean, actually good mobile games will likely have pretty representative ads. A lot of the ones that are so blatant are usually shovelware.
I guess while I'm here, I might as well post another example of a good ad.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...


Every single time I get these fake misleading ads are when I'm playing American/Western mobile games. I have yet a get any misleading ads when playing JP/KR mobile games. Hell I have yet to play a JP/KR mobile games that even have ads as part of the experience, while western game where it seems like it was designed to blast you with ads all the time.
 
Wilsongt

Wilsongt

Member
Oct 25, 2017
18,828
It's a consistent pattern with all of these games that in the end, turn out to be nothing but Evony clones, Final Fantasy XV's mobile game included
 
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