LOS
ANGELES, Sept. 16 — Welcome
to McDonald’s. Would you like virtual fries with that digital Big
Mac? No. 1 video game publisher Electronic Arts Inc. said Monday it
has struck multimillion-dollar product placement deals with
fast-food giant McDonald’s Corp. and chip heavyweight Intel Corp.
for its heavily anticipated computer game “The Sims
Online.”
ertsintcmcd
“SIMS ONLINE,” set to debut this holiday season, is the
Internet-based continuation of “The Sims,” a franchise that has sold more
than 19 million units worldwide, making it the best-selling PC game of all
time. “I think this deal ... reflects a
growing recognition by Madison Avenue that video games have become
mainstream entertainment with a large and desirable demographic target,”
EA spokesman Jeff Brown told Reuters. The
deal is the latest step in the game industry’s trend of moving its
business models closer to the Hollywood model. While product placement is
relatively new to games, movies such as Steven Spielberg’s “Minority
Report” have generated tens of millions of dollars in revenue from product
deals. Detailed terms of EA’s
multimillion-dollar deal were not available but it will allow Intel’s
familiar jingle, its product logo, and computers using its Pentium 4
processor to appear in the game. Players in
the game also will be able to buy a McDonald’s kiosk and sell the
company’s branded food products, earning ”simoleans,” the game’s currency.
Eating that food will also improve their standing within the
game. While video game companies
traditionally have had major brand names in their games, usually those
brands have been licensed for a fee by the publishers, rather than the
brands paying to be placed in the game.
Playing
now:
Brown said the
game was appealing to Intel and McDonald’s because almost all of its
players are young people, with nearly 50 percent of them young women, a
demographic group unrepresented by other video games.
He also said more product placement deals were likely to be
announced before the game’s launch, and that its online nature makes it
easy for further products to be inserted later.
While McDonald’s has not had much of a presence in video gaming to
date, the deal is just the latest push into the industry for Intel, which
has recognized the potential of the $30 billion international game
market. Besides the “Sims Online” deal,
Intel also is the primary sponsor of the Cyberathlete Professional League,
which puts on worldwide computer video gaming tournaments.
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