Massive names advertisers, says 40 games will sport ads

Are games the new TV? There's one company who thinks so, and today it announced a lineup of advertisers it hopes will make that odd-sounding question a reality.

The company is Massive Inc., a combination technology-play and ad-services startup intent on mining the opportunities it sees for placing ads in PC games via a Web-enabled stream. These in-game ad campaigns are more akin to a TV ad model than the traditional game model (which has consisted solely of product placement, something that remains unchanged for the life of the game).

Massive execs have been touting the new business model for about a year, promising that they would soon announce a lineup of advertisers. Publishers, including Ubisoft, Atari, and Vivendi Universal, have publicly put their bets on the Massive ad network, but until today, its lineup of advertisers had either been mentioned only selectively, or not at all.

The first flight of brands on board, according to Massive, are Dunkin' Donuts (previously announced), Honda Element, Nestle, Paramount, Coke, Intel, T-Mobile, and Universal Music Group. RealNetworks and Verizon had been announced as advertisers earlier.

In addition, Massive CEO Mitch Davis said that by year's end, 40 games from "10 top game publishers" would be in the channel and would act as vehicles for ad content managed by the Massive team.

Currently, the Massive network includes Ubisoft’s Splinter Cell Chaos Theory, Anarchy Online from Funcom, and Take-Two Interactive titles Mall Tycoon and Ski Resort.

As is done in the TV space, the Massive model hopes to offer advertisers "the opportunity to target gamers with different messages based on geography and time of day," according to the company. Through partner Nielsen Interactive Entertainment, Massive says it will provide "third-party accountability and measurement" for ads served via the Massive network.