Enemy Territory: QW Getting In-game Ads
The ad revenue will be used to offset the cost of updating the game.
by Daemon Hatfield

June 20, 2007 - On the official Enemy Territory: Quake Wars (ETQW) blog, Neil Postlethwaite, Managing Director for developer Splash Damage, has announced the game will be sprinkled with in-game advertising. The decision was apparently made to avoid passing on the cost of future game updates to players. After shipping in a couple weeks, the developer plans to keep supporting the game in "as many ways as possible."

"To help cover this level of on-going support without passing the costs on to the gamer, ETQW will feature appropriate advertisements in select locations of our levels," Postlethwaite said.

The developer wants to assure fans that the ads won't be inappropriate -- in fact, Postlethwaite believes there are instances where it would be inappropriate not to have in-game ads.

"The ads aren't intrusive and you won't have to interact with them; they'll just be part of the normal environment. In fact, there are some places it's quite odd not to have an advertisement -- the sides of container trucks, for example. Great care is being taken to ensure that all our ads are appropriate for the game world and we have absolute approval rights in this area. If it's not appropriate or it's distracting, it won't go in."

Postlethwaite says the company providing the ads won't be storing any personal information on gamers, only if and how long they view the ads. The advertisements will be implemented in the upcoming beta test.

"Choosing to place ads in Enemy Territory was not a decision we made lightly. However, in doing so we hope to be able to provide a higher level of on-going support to the Enemy Territory: Quake Wars community than would have been possible otherwise."

from IGN.com

Is it one where first one to find it gets  a prize?