The most bizarre Perfect World ad....

This ad just popped up on Facebook, by "register.perfectworld.com" and for STO. This is the copy:

"Follow the rules of acquisition as a Ferengi in Star Trek Online & bribe & cheat your way to the top! More is good. All is better!"

Whoever wrote that copy has not played a Ferengi in-game. (I have a new Ferengi alt.) Ferengi have as a species trait a discount for requisitions. That's it. No wheeling and dealing, no cheating. Also, it's clear from "The Path to 2409"/"The Needs of the Many" that a Ferengi who is joining Starfleet has likely done so to spite these characteristics of the Ferengi culture.

It's just, weird. The ad has no relevance to the game whatsoever.

Welcome to Marketing 101. LOL.

Every job I worked as a designer that had anything to do with advertising (especially my year at the community paper) had us creating the most absurd copy to try and make each ad stand out from every other ad we did. I look back at some of them and cringe.

Even the good ones do it. I remember when Microsoft was going from the XP era into the Vista era, Apple was doing the "I'm a Mac, I'm a PC" series of commercials. As someone who worked on both professionally, I was both irked (as a PC user) and amused how Apple criticized "PC" for needing to get new components in order to upgrade from XP to Vista. Conveniently forgetting the little detail many Mac users needed to replace entire systems when they went from 9 to OS X because of major requirement change and Mac's limited upgrade capability (not to mention Mac driver patches are much longer in the coming than PC.

We were happy about getting new systems for the upgrade, but the company wasn't about the cost, and we weren't because of the down time in getting the new systems set up and everything transferred over.

Okay... sorry about the ramble. That's just marketing for you.

For real. Have seen the new F2P Trailer? It's really awesome, but has little to do with the game whatsoever. It shows off stuff that isn't normal gameplay at all.

(Invalid video video code)

Wow, Nick. I want to play that game!!!!

For realz, yo. That end scene with the two borg cubes sounds so dramatic, until you actually play the game and realize with that many fed ships, that battle would last 2 seconds, 5 if I go get a coke and autofire on.

Quote by NicholasJohn16

For realz, yo. That end scene with the two borg cubes sounds so dramatic, until you actually play the game and realize with that many fed ships, that battle would last 2 seconds, 5 if I go get a coke and autofire on.

LOL Nick. Half that stuff in the trailer ive never seen and ive been playing STO for about 7 months.

The concept of deceit has always mystified me. I suppose I could never be a marketer (and, for that matter, have learnt I should never write headlines, ever).

Marketing and Ads haven't been about the reality of things for quite some time if ever. It's all about making the product your trying to sell/promote seem interesting and make you think it's what you want.

The point of Marketing isn't exactly to outright lie to people, especially when you're promoting a game. It's about bending the reality of the gameplay to make it look interesting to the kinds of people you want playing your games.

As previously stated, it's nothing new. For those of you who can remember getting a brand new 8 bit nintendo box in your hot little hands as a kid, you'll be keenly familiar with the disparity between the box art and how much it actually has to do with the actual gameplay.

I had a phase where I watched old commercials from time to time. There's definitely been a transition in advertising.

In the 50s and 60s, commercials were still largely about informaing people about products and services. Then thru the 70s and 80s, it changed to giving people warm fuzzies about products.

Today, companies are all about their "brand". Forget about the details of the products, you should buy it because you like the company that makes it.

The sad thing is that the whole "selling the brand" thing works more often than people like to admit. I mean it runs the gamut from the bread & peanut butter you buy to the electronics that fill your home. We all know the Mac fanboys, but think about the last time you went to the store and got peanut butter... Why did you buy the brand you bought, not because there is a major difference in the peanut butter (unless you buy organic stuff) you probably bought it because that's what you always get. You buy the brand.

I get whatever peanut butter is cheapest, myself.

Quote by SiranNataan

I get whatever peanut butter is cheapest, myself.

I bought them all (the organic / natural ones) and just go with the one I think tastes best to me.

I buy two brands of peanut butter, JIF natural for the taste and Peter Pan natural because it's a little runny and easier to mix when I'm cooking.

Quote by Halish

Wow, Nick. I want to play that game!!!!

Me too. LOL.

Guess since it's free to play, new players can't exactly sue for false advertising, right?