IGA Worldwide has signed a multi-year deal with Activision to serve ads on the company's PS3 games, starting with "Guitar Hero World Tour."
Set for release on October 26, the newest version of Guitar Hero will be equipped with integrated advertising.
IGA Worldwide announced in June that it would be the exclusive in-game ad provider for Electronic Arts' PlayStation 3 games, meaning that the company has now captured exclusive deals with the top two video game publishers for PS3.
This looks like bad news for Double Fusion, IGA's closest competitor, which signed a deal to distribute ads on Sony's (SNE) PS3 games earlier this year. Sony's PS3 has an open ad network that allows multiple users to deliver dynamic advertising to its console base. If IGA continues to snag exclusive partnership, it could corner a good chunk of the market.
Video game ads are seen to have great potential to reach the young male demographic, but the industry is still nascient with the ad spend still below $200 million this year. It is expected to reach $800 million in the U.S. by 2012, according to Parks Associates, but that's still just a small piece of the current $3 trillion ad industry.
Photo: Flickr/f_mafra
