 | |
| Company type | Subsidiary |
|---|---|
| Industry | Advertising |
| Founded | 2002; 24 years ago (2002) |
| Founder | Mitch Davis |
| Defunct | October 2010; 15 years ago (2010-10) |
| Headquarters | New York City,New York, U.S. |
Key people | Mitch Davis (CEO) Craig Telfer (director of integration) Nick Gonzalez (Founding CTO) David Sturman (2003 thru Acquisition) (CTO) Claudia Batten Client Relations,Nicholas LonganoCMO, Katherine HayesCOO |
| Products | In-game advertising |
| Parent | Microsoft (2006–2010) |
| Website | No longer exists |
Massive Incorporated was an Americanadvertising company that provided software and services to dynamically host advertisements withinvideo games. Massive Incorporated was purchased byMicrosoft in May 2006 for approximately $200 million to $400 million.[1][2]
The company closed down at the end of 2010.[3]
The service, collectively known asThe Massive Network, allowsgame developers to place advertisements within video games by providing asoftware development kit (SDK) andservers to host advertisements to be streamed to clients when the game is played. The streaming of advertisements allows old advertisements to be removed and more contextual ones applied in their place. Where games such asNeed For Speed: Most Wanted had static advertisements forCingular andBurger King,[4] advertisements supplied by a streaming network allow for time-limited ads such asmovie orTV show posters. Both the publisher and Massive can then continue to make money after the game has been sold.
The software is made so as to capture the properdemographic: it would be a problem to advertise anR-rated movie in aG-rated game or to place advertisements that conflict with a game'sgenre.
First, placement and layout of the advertisements is planned by the developers with help from Massive. Advertisements can be anytexture, but to maintain realism, advertisements are generally placed on objects such asposters,billboards, storefronts, and other likely media. Massive calls this "Phase I: Design of the Inventory Elements."
Second, the SDK is integrated with the game to act as a client to Massive's ad servers. It allows the game to fetch the ad, display it on a surface, and analyze how the player acts around it. Massive refers to this as "Phase II: Integration of the Software Development Kit (SDK)."
Third is self-explanatory, "Phase III: Testing & Support." These are thesoftware testing anddeployment steps.
