Iron Man 2 Sports A Ton Of Tie-Ins

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Iron Man 2 is expected by many to be the biggest blockbuster of the year, and the movie will have $100 million in media buys, retail tie-ins and giveaways to match. The long list of marketers for Paramount includes Audi, Burger King, 7-Eleven, Land o’ Frost, Dr Pepper, LG Electronics, Hershey’s, Oracle, Royal Purple, and Symantec

“The key here is to get excitement about our brand to all of our partners,” Dave Fleming, Dr Pepper’s director-brand marketing, said, referring to retailers and bottlers. “And to be able to do a promotional spot where a Dr Pepper machine is being made in Tony Stark’s lab is really one of a kind.”

Source: Ad Age {link no longer active}

Ad Agencies Mostly Pleasing Clients

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A survey from CMO Council today of 600 senior marketing executives said that 59 percent have no inclination to switch their ad agencies. Additionally, 35 percent rated their agency partners as “pretty good” and 17 percent said they were “extremely valuable.”

Other results show that just eight percent of those looking to change their business practices cited their ad shop; comparatively, 17 percent said they’d switch Web design and 14 percent said they’d change their PR practices.  With the worst of the recession expected to be over, roughly 75 percent of executives indicated they will either increase or keep their ad budgets the same.

Source: Ad Week

Miyamoto Talks Super Mario Galaxy 2 And Why He Won’t Retire

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Shigeru Miyamoto has become one the the elder statesmen for both Nintendo and the gaming industry as a whole, having produced countless classic titles over the years. Still, the creator of Mario is 57 years old which raises the question of retirement… but Miyamoto isn’t even considering that right now.

“Well, I am one of the company workers and the company has to retire me some time. So from that perspective, yes I may have to retire from Nintendo some day,” said Miyamoto. “But when I look around and see how aged cartoonists continue to work on their manga and how movie directors create new movies all the time, I understand that they would never retire. And by the same token, I guess I will still be making games somehow. The only question is whether the younger people will be willing to work with me at that far point in the future.”

Super Mario Galaxy is the first numerical sequel to a Mario game since Super Mario Bros. 3, and Miyamoto acknowledged the significance of the move. “In the past we had Super Mario Bros. 1, 2 and 3 and then Super Mario World. And the reason Super Mario World was not Super Mario Bros. 4 was that we wanted to make it clear to the audience that this new game would give you some new experiences that you could not expect from Super Mario Bros,” explained Miyamoto. “And although we originally thought that Super Mario Galaxy 2 would simply be made from additional challenges for those who had completed the first game, as we progressed with the creation of Super Mario Galaxy 1.5 we noticed that there were too many new experiences for it to be merely an incremental update, and that it felt more like a completely new game. But since it still uses many of the core Galaxy ideas, we ve named it Super Mario Galaxy 2.”

“When asked about the large number of violent games made by other publishers,” Miyamoto responded, “Well, as a rule I am trying not to comment on the works of other people. But one thing I can tell you is that I really appreciate the variety of different videogames that are being made by so many different types of people. However, many people are working solely in a single genre that is concentrated on excessive violence, and the only competition there is who can come up with the most violent depictions. That s not something that I really appreciate. And I think that when there are many people working in such a genre, the job of me and Nintendo is to try to establish to the world that there are a great many other ways to take advantage of the interactive format of videogames; to provide fun and surprise to the people around the world.”

Miyamoto was also probed about the enigmatic nature of the Vitality Sensor, which was contrasted with how HD was easier for consumers to get their heads around. “Well, you know, whenever we are working on something new and unexpected, that s something very interesting and fun for us to do internally, so Nintendo will always continue to pursue such challenges,” said Miyamoto. “One thing I would like to tell you, and to tell your readers, is that whenever Nintendo makes some public announcement about some new project, Nintendo has done so only after being able to confirm internally that it is something that the general public will be able to appreciate.”

When asked about who inspires him as a designer, Miyamoto at first deferred, but then said, “Now that I think about it, though, Mr. Will Wright is a very unique person and someone very special because he has a unique way of thinking about everything that he does. So that reminds me how important the individual s thinking style is when coming up with new and unique game experiences.”

Source: GamesTM {link no longer active}

Facebook Pushing Its Web Influence

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Facebook will no doubt go into business and technology plans during their F8 conference, much like Twitter did at their own conference. Early reports are that the site will unveil a Like button and a social toolbar for personal websites as a means to stay relevant.

Facebook knows that Friendster and MySpace failed to permanently capture their respective audiences, which have mostly moved on to Facebook. The company is aware of this, and is making moves to solidify its web presence.

“Facebook longs to become a sturdy platform,” writes Pete Cashmore. “The more businesses rely on Facebook, the less likely it is to fail. Zynga has already built a company valued at more than $1 billion using Facebook as a platform, and thousands of websites now use Facebook Connect for their login systems. The toolbar and web-wide ‘like’ button are the next phase; by providing more distributed services, Facebook becomes invaluable. Credits, Connect, toolbars these are all distributed plays that try to weave Facebook’s social graph throughout the fabric of the web.”

“Rather than aiming to be the coolest bar in town and losing its clientele when they leave for a hipper spot, Facebook plans to become the Starbucks of the web, with a Like button on every corner,” he adds.

Source: Mashable

Apple Dominates Mobile Ad Impressions

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Millennial Media today released a study for advertisers, which says that smartphones generated 45 percent of mobile impressions and feature phones took 34 percent. Connected devices, like the DS, PSP, iPod Touch and iPad account for 21 percent of the U.S. impressions in March 2009.

“We felt that it was now time to spotlight this data for industry watchers who are trying to understand the role of devices and consumer behavior in the overall mobile market,” said Erin McKelvey, senior vice president of marketing at Millennial.

Apple dominated the smartphone sphere, with the iPhone OS generating a 70 percent share of ad impressions, and devices from the company overall generated the largest share of impressions across Millennial’s network at 40 percent.

Source: MediaPost {link no longer active}

Zynga Sues Virtual Currency Trader

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Zynga today sued PlayerAuctions.com for enabling the sale of of their virtual items. The Facebook developer has in the past gone after other third-parties which have sold virtual currency used in their games like Mafia Wars and Farmville.

“Zynga has not authorized any third party to sell the ‘virtual currency’ or ‘virtual goods’ required to play the games,” the company wrote.

Zynga says that PlayerAuctions has interfered with the user agreement, which bars players from selling virtual items through channels outside the game. They also say that PlayerAuctions has violated Zynga’s trademarks and copyrights by using the names and images from the games.

Source: MediaPost {link no longer active}

iPad 3G Given May 7 Launch Date

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Those who pre-ordered the iPad 3G will receive their product by the end of April as promised. New orders of the device, however, will ship on May 7, two weeks later than originally announced, Apple said today.

“Thank you for your recent order of the magical and revolutionary iPad 3G,” read an email message to iPad 3G pre-order customers. “We would like to confirm that your order will be shipped in late April as communicated at the time you placed your order. You will receive a confirmation notice when your order has shipped.”

Demand for the iPad in the U.S. has caused a delay in the rollout of the device in other territories.

Splinter Cell PR Stunt Draws Police Attention

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As part of a promotional campaign in New Zealand for Splinter Cell: Conviction, an actor threatened pub goers at the Degree bar in Auckland. The clientele was not aware that the gun wasn’t real and the incident was staged.

“This guy with bandages on his hands pointed a gun at customers sitting outside,” said Degree manager Steph Kurtovich. “They were pretty terrified.”

When police arrived, the situation was thankfully resolved without violence. Monaco Corporation said that they hired another company for the promotion and weren’t told about the fake gun.

“This was by no means an attempt to get cops down there and get this sort of exposure. We do apologize, we shouldn’t have had guns down there,” said Duane Mutu, Monaco’s marketing manager. “It was just marketing gone wrong.”

Source: IndustryGamers {link no longer active}