The Fake Mobile Game Adverts Are Getting More Cyncial

Summary

Mobile game adverts now feature fake, and extremely annoying, streamers
This tactic suggests an increased authority for streamers, on the level of celebrities even if the streamer is unknown
It all feels pretty dystopian for a fake match three game

We all know those adverts we see for mobile games are fake. There's a guy trying to get gold by moving around metal bars to shift goblins and lava and water, or there are a bunch of soldiers going through various gates to multiply their numbers, promote themselves, or get better weapons, inevitably making the wrong decision before being crushed by an almighty beast. The less said about the woman with the straggly hair and stink lines, the better. But there is a new form of deceptive adverts disguising themselves as streamer endorsements, and it's a worrying trend.

The original fake mobile ads have always seemed strange to me. They never promise anything particularly sophisticated, and in fact one developer even made the෴ metal bars game for real, so it's odd that there is any deception at play. Some of these rely on a strange narrative hook, like the simple match three game advertised with murdering grannies and Pedro Pascal wandering an abandoned house, or the toad who drinks golden liquid from the base of a feminine statue, but mostly they just show you a mildly fun game that they aren't actually offering.

Advertising Has Always Been The Art Of Lying

Close-up of the Koskela Brothers Coffee World TV advertisement, with Ilmo wearing a Coffee World uniform with mug and Oh Deer Diner thermos.

Obviously, the main point of these games is not to be played at all. If you've ever been curious enough to download one, you'll have been hit by two banner ads and a video ad on the home screen, then another ad when you start playing, then an ad after every level and each time you die, followed by unskippable ads to decrease your cooldown time. There's something to admire in this deception - it's an honest dishonesty, showing you a cheap, mass produced advert to sell several different shovelware mimics that only exist as framing for an endless reel of commercials. It's good old fashioned lying. This new era finds a way to be even less truthful.

A common trope these days 🎃is for an advert to show a green screened streamer talking about the game in generic terms with false enthusiasm, not so much selling the game itself but t🦹he feelings you get while playing it. Sometimes this gets even darker, with the streamer presenting themselves as a get rich quick guru, pushing you to download a pay for play app where you earn money testing out a game for developer data.

There is part of me that feels my Millennial bones creaking as I write this. For as long as adverts have existed, so have spokespeople. That guy in the insurance advert doesn't really think Qwingos Insurance is the best in the world, he's just an actor they paid to say that. Gigi Hadid doesn't really drink full sugar Coca-Cola while making pasta with her ethnically diverse friend group - it's just a commercial. But these feel different.

These Adverts Don’t Even Look Like Adverts, Blurring The Truth

Something about the pretence of recommendations by streamers feels more dystopian than a celebrity who is very obviously in an advert for a product they are sponsored by. Streamers are already selective with how much they disclose sponꦕsorships, and often seem to want the credibility and access of journalists with the lowered responsibility and bigger audience base of entertainer💙s.

When a celebrity says a soft drink is the best, we know they're being paid to say that. When a streamer says a video game is the best, we're never sure, and that makes fake streamers a far more worrying issue. It speaks to a shift in audience appeal. With celebrity endorsements, they only work if you know the celebrity (and thus know how selective they are with endorsements, and what their values are). These fake streamers aren't famous, they have no earned status. They're just streamers, and that apparently comes with weight.

These are not famous streamers possibly being dishonest about being paid to say that a video game is good. There is certainly 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:a pr💫obꦡlem with parasocial streamer relationships leading to viewers being 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:funnelled into adult content or gambling, but this is different. The people in these adverts aren't streamers. They're just actors in headphones reading a script about a gacha game. It suggests that success or credibility is not important for a streamer spokesperson, only that they be a streamer at all. It underlines the influence streamers have simply by virtue of being streamers, not because of the value of their opinion, depth of their research, or level of their success.

These games probably aren't great, and the adverts are so dull and wooden that they're unlikely to convince many people to buy them (I'd be more tempted by the multiplying soldiers). But they still speak to a shift in influences where streamers, often unchecked and unregulated, sway culture with words that can be bought cheaply. Success doesn't even seem to be a factor. The theory is, if you're a streamer, people will listen. Call me old fashioned, but I prefer Michael Jordan trying to sell me a Burger King.