NBA 2K19 Fans Are Upset Because Their $60 Game Has Unskippable Ads

[Tsing]

The controversy seems a little late (being that the sports title debuted months ago), but NBA 2K19 players began ranting this week about the unskippable ads that play before matches. It's understandable why they're upset: this is a $60 game and not a F2P title.

"Yeah, my game got to 100% and instead of letting me edit match ups (which you can normally do while the game loads) or letting me go straight to the game, I had to sit there and finish the ad," said one commenter. "Absolutely pathetic from 2k again."

"What does it change if the ad is unskippable anyway? Why are they there at all?" asked another. "There should be 0 ads in a game that comes out yearly and costs 60 bucks," opined someone else.

There's an option that is supposed to turn them off, but Eurogamer claims it doesn't work.

If you've found the adverts troublesome, Reddit mod yyy2k reminded players they can turn off "2KTV" in the main menu settings. "2KTV is over for the season anyways and if you want to watch it for the VC you can always go directly to it's section in the game," they said. However, I've just tested this myself and despite deselecting 2KTV in the main menu, a loading screen ad rolled nonetheless. Insert shrug emoji here.

 

[Nanobot]

I'm only surprised it took people so long to complain.

 

[Zarathustra]

I'm not a proponent of software piracy (I like developers to get paid for their work) but ****, if a game I want starts displaying ads, I'm either going to pass on it, or pirate it as an FU to the publisher.

 

[Grimlakin]

I tend to agree with Zarathustra here. Why the hell would I BUY a game to have adds thrown in my face when I want to play it. That would be like logging into your favorite monthly subscription MMO to have adds for freaking pizza hut show up. Thanks but no thanks!

 

[DejaWiz]

This is ridiculous. Interruptive commercials in games. Sheesh.

Now, I don't mind seeing some passive ads (like the Sprite vending machines in Splinter Cell Chaos Theory) as long as they aren't obstructive/interruptive to gameplay, but there's no way I would open my wallet and pay for a game that forces television-style commercial breaks on me.

 

[Nanobot]

I have a feeling that this is going to be the wave of the future as advertisers will find a way to get their stuff in front of the most eyeballs. Not sure why they just don't do what they did in movies: product placement. ****, for sports games they could easily just have ads throughout the arena/field like they already do irl. Pausing the games to show a commercial is lazy.

 

[northrop]

"We don't call them in-game commercials, we call them Surprise Entertainment" - 2K reps everywhere