That particular example does not seem too bad.
I personally would have just assumed the ad to be yet another random lock screen image. Which I like for the most part.
I personally would have just assumed the ad to be yet another random lock screen image. Which I like for the most part.
Pretty picture of a New Zeeland countryside? Ad for NZ tourism office.
Pretty picture of a data center chockfull of network equipment and mainframes? Ad for IBM and Cisco.
Microsoft have been doing that since Bing, show a pretty interesting picture with a little icon to know where that picture is from. It just happens that one is from a game.
People are so tired of obnoxious and disgusting ads that they tend to forget why they hate obnoxious and disgusting ads; because they are obnoxious and disgusting. Then they go on an irrational crusade about every picture, awesome viral video, mystery public campaign just because it originates from a corporation.
It's a very attractive piece of high quality concept art. It doesn't even have a logo.
Is it for a game that they sell? Yes. But come on. This is one of the least invasive advertisements I've ever seen.
This is product placement at it's best, really. It's subtle, attention-catching on its artistic merits, and stays out of your way if you're uninterested.
I'll even go as far as suggest that this is exactly the kind of advertising I'd prefer, if we must have advertising (that point can be debated).