It's bad, but not surprising considering the rampant sexism in video game culture.

And that's coming from a devoted gamer.

As a gamer, I'm so embarrassed by these. I feel like this is what non gamers think of when someone refers to themselves as liking video games. Some boob obsessed shut in.

Well, we all are so accustomed to ignoring internet ads, something needs to grab our attention at least long enough to read. It's either going to be dancing aliens or breasts.

This is pretty much the bottom of the barrel as previous comments have pointed out. I'm not sure that calling this a "video game" is even accurate. I haven't gone anywhere near it (I generally avoid clicking on web ads...) but it's probably just an ad site with some kind of "game-lite" mechanic, if it's not just some kind of spam.

I did think the whole "play now, my lord" thing was a bit striking. One variation of these ads (for the same game, I think) had the tagline "save your lover" with a picture of two women. Wasn't sure quite what to make of that, aside from the obvious possibility that they'd figured out that two girls together might entice more people to click than one on her own. For a minute, I thought of the possibility that it about a woman saving her (female) lover, but I think that was probably giving them too much credit.

In total agreement with Jennifer and Ryan.
I'm a big videogame fan, and most of the games I play are very unsexist in their content. But the gamer culture is hugely sexist, and it seems that--as more women become interested in games and overtly express our videogame nerd-dom--the more sexist the ads and the views expressed by male gamers seem to be.
I'm pretty sure this is another example of targeted backlash, as seen in other arenas (such as sports and certain careers) that have traditionally been seen as "masculine".

So it's not surprising to see another example of a ridiculously sexist videogame ad, which has nothing whatever to do with the content of the game, and which works to estrange female gamers. I saw another such some months ago, which I believe was for F.E.A.R. 2, which purportedly sold a "protection plan", wherein a scantily clad "nurse" would come make you feel better after being scared by the game. "You" if you are a man, of course.
I cannot find it now to share it, sadly, though if anyone knows where to look I do think it's pertinent to this post.

Matt K -- it is a game, a strategy game, with a fairly light ad presence on the main playing screen.

Yes, I play it. It's fun. It has nothing whatsoever to do with boobs, and these ads make me reconsider playing it at all since they clearly aren't considering their female audience at all, and I'm loathe to be where I'm not welcome.

Ugh... those breasts in the last ad are hard to look at. Clearly photoshopped into an unrealistic shape.

I've noticed the earlier ads in this sequence showing up on my own sites as well as the gaming sites I frequent. Last night I saw the last ad pictured above, aka 'the bra ad'. At first I overlooked it because I thought it was an actual clothing ad. Then I noticed the little "Evony" under the "PLAY" -- and started laughing so hard my husband had to come rescue me. Poor Evony.

The MMO I'm involved with had to take down Evony's ads because of the Boob Ladies (and yes, "Save Your Lover" was another of their campaigns), since our game has a bunch of little kids, and parents were complaining. They're very misleading ads.

wow, that's fucking hilarious.

And by hilarious, I mean ridiculous.

wow... the whole "play now secretly!" makes it sound like a porn game.

i wish i knew where i read this, but many months ago i saw a great demonstration of the inverse relation of boob size to armor coverage in games.

basically the bigger the boobs, the skimpier the armor. but the flat chested women are frequently covered head to toe in armor. i try to pay attention now and as of yet i haven't seen any examples of this ratio being incorrect.

I noticed this the other day. I enjoy anything medieval, so I took notice of these ads even if I wasn't about to join another "free" internet game.
I noted with interest as the medieval elements of the ad gradually disappeared. I didn't get the bra one, but the last one I saw looked like a photograph of a model in a very modern looking skimpy negligee. If I was ever going to play that game, this gradual deterioration of the ads insured that I never will.

It isn't just this bad advertising. Evony is a big scam from Chinese gold farmers. A lot more on what is going on can be found here: http://www.bruceongames.com/2009/07/10/dont-play-evony/

The not-so-subtle references to female subserviance is really the cherry on the cake, no?

These ads have been bugging me for weeks: thank you for calling them up on it. I actually find the taglines more offensive (perhaps I'm desensitised to boobs) for the implications that if you play this game you will win a harem of willing, lobotomised porn folk and that should obviously be you goal in life.

wow, I can't believe this! In some twisted way their utter desperation is actually sort of funny. That is if you ignore the blatant misogyny.

Ha! I've been watching these adverts evolve on You Tube, but I hadn't seen the latest one until today on your blog.

I actually found it laugh out loud funny it's so out there and stupid. I feel embarrassed on men's behalf looking at them though; it's an insult to them as well as to women. I mean, how shallow, basic and idiotic do people think men are!?

Speaking of games:
Ridiculous Life Lessons for Girls
http://bit.ly/P5JHE

I hope 2K (the owner of Civ) sues these guys so I never have to see the ads again

I'm with hoshi - the "play discreetly" vibe does make it sound like there are adult themes involved. Very tricky, Evony, if that is your real name. (Civony?)

I...I really, really thought that the last picture there was a parody you folks had made. They seriously used that ad? I'd seen the others (and had the same basic reactions of "oh gee look boobies" and "really? my LORD, stressed? do they not want what few female players there might be?"), but that's...just astonishing.

"Help! Save the Queen ... from the uncanny valley" is more like it. The art makes me throw up a little in my mouth. The only thing worse than blatantly and desperately objectifying women to make a few bucks is *clumsily* and *ineptly* blatantly and desperately objectifying women to make a few bucks. Good lord. If that's not proof enough that these guys have never seen a real woman in her underwear before I don't know what is... :p

I've been meaning to write about that one with the sword pointing at the digital boobies.

Finally, Sociological Images discusses this ad! I was also thinking how this ad escaped the "Sexual Censorship" of Google (as Fat Angie has pointed out in her comment) Only the last two ads and another Civony ad featuring a busty brunette woman in the same pose as the second blonde woman seem even mildly hinting at sex to me; but this is the US after all, where even the slightest cleavage is seen as "OMG SEX!!!" (Which helps the porn industry and the sleazy marketers.) Does anyone know why Google might have been uh, "lenient" on these specific ads? Someone at another site even suggested that the scammer has connections with Google China.

To the commentors: Oh, and why would it be only men who look at these ads? Couldn't it be lesbians and bisexual people, too? I know, it's tailored for the "Hierarchical Heterosexual Male Gaze", but still...

Oh, and why would it be only men who look at these ads? Couldn’t it be lesbians and bisexual people, too?

Lesbians *love* it when women are objectified to sexually appeal to men, I've always said! (Less snarkily, yes, breasts *do* appeal to groups other than heterosexual men, but that doesn't mean that these other groups don't realize who this is aimed at -- especially when saying "my LORD" and whatnot. I think the female form is lovely but I don't like it being constantly used to try and reel men in by their dicks, thx muchly.)

I think the above ad (the last, most devolved one) means "BREAST free web game."

SPEAK ENGLISH OR GO BACK HOME !!!

"I think the above ad (the last, most devolved one) means “BREAST free web game.”"

LOL.

The ads had a macho gender slant from the beginning, of course. The first ad first well with the rest of them.

Here's a relevant Media Education Foundation video -
http://www.mediaed.org/cgi-bin/commerce.cgi?preadd=action&key=205

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Wy200YTx6I
This is a link to a full page screen shot of another Evony video game ad complete with girl in tank top full of boobies.

I don't call it sexism I call it marketing, when you put real women down,pay them less, treat them worse in real life settings that's sexism.

When you want to play up sex to drive adverts/sales you want to go with figures that are appeasing to the masses and since the days of the renascence its female + curves that is more appeasing to the masses that's marketing.

Though if you went with hot men and in cool weapons/armor it would draw as mnay people but the mix of man-ase and cool weaponry has to be right...boobs to tend to be....easier to use? =0-o=

This is one of the most brilliant marketing campaigns I've ever seen.

I don't think they seriously intended for people to click because they saw breasts. They just wanted to make noise, and this got them some amazing publicity. The (de)volution of these ads is hilarious, and who really talked about Evony before it? It's just another free online game, of which there are millions. But now it's the game with the boob ads everyone's talking about, and that's going to spark curiosity about what the game actually consists of, particularly because there aren't any boobs in the game.

Some marketing designer knows what he's doing.

F.E.A.R.2 video as mentioned by Magnetic Crow can be found at: http://www.destructoid.com/f-e-a-r-2-promotional-trailer-has-a-hot-nurse-in-it-also-gameplay-119025.phtml.

Funny story: my girlfriend and i were talking on aim and she sends me a link and says "Doesn't the girl in this picture look so [i]glamourous[/i]?"
I'm not sure what to do with that, but I agree with everyone else that this is a pretty pathetic ad campaign.

Marc Umbricht
Females are less fussy when it comes to "beauty" even if you sex it up it they don't see it like men who see BEWBS first. This is why females are portrayed alot more in ads guys tend to dislike manly or glamorous men far more than women dislike beautiful or glamorous females.

Law of averages I suppose beautiful females generate more interest.

And also there is the sexist Queen of Evony competition: http://www.bruceongames.com/2009/07/31/queen-of-evony-competition/

Also Evony has a sexist Queen of Evony competition: http://www.bruceongames.com/2009/07/31/queen-of-evony-competition/

I've been seeing these ads on Facebook for months, and they drive me crazy. I haven't seen the last one that's strictly boobs, but there are several others, and all involve much cleavage and women with a "come fuck me" look on their faces. A couple of them had very odd jutting bones and big ropey veins standing out of their totally white skin. I found most of the ads disturbing in one way or another.

The really sad thing, ITS A BORING STRATEGY GAME! No boobs included. I wonder how many people dove in and downloaded this only to find they were playing a badly pixelated version of risk.
I really do wonder.

Kind of funny, I was drawn to this game from the first aid being I like strategy based games: warcraft, starcraft, total annihilation...ect. It was an "ok" game in my views but wasting so much real time to build a digital army was a joke so I started to pull away and did not want to spend money for less building time. Then I started noticing the ad campaign changing. I thought it was ok at first, they were just adding new content the "Save the Queen" Mission (does not exist by the way) but I was wrong. I guess its just sad to see such false advertisement in a game with great potential

So! I clicked the link to see the sexist F.E.A.R. 2 game ad and was watching, quite disgusted, when something ironic, disturbing, and even a little funny happened... An Evony ad popped up!
I took a screen shot just for you guys! (Aren't I sweet?)

http://s301.photobucket.com/albums/nn51/hihicutiepie/?action=view&current=Sexism.jpg

As you can see, the ad at the bottom of the video cuts out part of the woman's face in order to get a clear, centered shot of her breasts... Also, they address the person looking at the ad by "My Lord," they're obviously selling to male players. >.< All of this while two scantily clad "nurses" massage and dote on a young man. It was almost too much for me to handle!

I am an avid player of the Evony game and quite frankly I love it! Not because of adds that just so happen to have boobs on them, (I prefer butts anyway)but because its more of a 'patience' type of game. Its a good way to relax at the computer.
To help justify the idea (apart from that stupid 'bra add'), in midevil times that 'pushed up boobs' look was actually in style. So is a company going to make a game 'unrealistic' just because some people are so out of it that they have to complain about a game they've probably never played just because it has boobs?! Give me a break......!

That last ad was a joke right? Right?!

Nope... I've seen it all over the place. By the way, take a look at this: http://www.gamervision.com/gamer/coop/news/article/girl_in_evony_ad_slowly_shedding_clothing

gaming is one of the hottest things these days..people are crazy about gaming especially youngsters. http://www.pspgamesblog.com

gaming is one of the hottest things these days..psp games and ps3 games are so hot these days.

WHERE DO I FIND THIS GAME???

These video game ads are awesome. I think they would get more out of them if they submitted them to Adwido, and other sites that accept image ads.

So I'm not the only one noticing the ever increasing amount of boobs in current (video game) ads. I have been making screenshots of every ad that fits the 'boobs' theme. My collection has 58 of them, of 38 distinct games and some webcomics. I might put it online some day, with comments.

Of course you won't hear me complain, looking at boobs is never a bad thing. Those games don't interest me at all, so I don't care that they lack the boobs from their ads.

fuck the game, whos that dark haired woman, DO WANT MOAR PICS!!!!

I play this game, and it has nothing to do with girls and you never see any boobs. But there are a lot of horny guys who get on and look for underage girls.

Theres more

This is more than a little sad, but I can understand the phenomenon. Internet ads must be among the least resonant forms. My impression is most people who spend a sugnificant amount of time online are very adept at ignoring most of them, looking between them at the content you're interested in. I can confidently say that in, what, 10 years or so, I have NOT ONCE clicked on a banner ad from a website.

Hastening to add that I don't click on the Evony one either, I can say that the later ones did 'cut through' to use an industry term, if only to elicit a 'what is that smut doing on my Facebook?' response. However, no doubt the developers feel their target audience will be very tempted by the implied erotic nature and 'discreet' gameplay.

To be honest, I find the notion of sweaty gamers feverishly questing their way through hours of generic fantasy RPG, desperate to reach the point where oodles of softcore animations are unlocked more funny than anything else.

I mean really, the jokes on them, isn't it?

For those who want more, I cleaned up my ‘collection’ and made it available. Enjoy! http://homes.esat.kuleuven.be/~athomas/Nerd-ads/

they don't show enough boobs

There's another ad on the left of http://www.nfopocalypse.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/civony-ads.gif from http://www.nfopocalypse.com/index.php/2009/05/13/civony-gold-farmers-go-first-party/

hmmm... "games", you say? I'll have to look into this new phenomenon you call "gaming"

The first time I saw one of those images with the women, I seriously thought it was for a dating site, until I looked closely. I'm not even sure what the game's about now, although I never cared in the first place. Isn't that one prospect of an advertisement is to let people know at least a little bit of what you're advertising about? I guess these guys missed the message. Instead, they're misleading people, a common thing in advertisements, I guess. The problem is, they're not technically selling anything. It's free, for crying out loud. Don't people like free things? If anything, they had me at "free." I mean, I'm a lesbian, sure, but that doesn't mean worth squat because I'm too smart to know what they're doing. That and I have a girlfriend.

Anyway, here's an idea: if you're going to advertise like this, why not make a game featuring women like this? It would be completely ridiculous, sure, but it would also, at the very least, be honest. THEN make your inspired-by-medieval-times game . . . with sexy chained up maidens waiting for you to "save them," of course!

The most recent ads I've seen (www.realitynewsonline.com) have moved away from the breast meme. Now they're Flash-animated: an opaque drop of "sweat" drips down a shiny, damp woman's face with copy reading, "The Hottest Game Online...[snip]...Don't Sweat It. It's Free."

I don't have enough teaspoons for this.

Check this out!

http://gamepolitics.com/2009/09/15/evony-files-libel-suit-against-blogger

Oh look. I found another ad.
http://img29.imageshack.us/img29/7896/evonyishorrible.jpg

I found another one at www.flashgames247.com

http://img193.imageshack.us/i/evonyad.png/

Okay, am I the only one who sees how discriminating these adds are? sex sells, sure, but thats our fault for putting it out there. So if we MUST put up with boobs in our faces wherever we go, then i wanna see some guys with THEIR tops off for a change!

And yes, I see how the joke is on those people who stupidly play the game because they think there is merit in the advertising, but really, why do we have to cheapen women all the time? I thought we'd fought for our rights and won a long time ago, but of course, we'll never really have any rights if people don't start respecting us for who we are, not what we look like and WE don't stop letting them.

Sorry to break up the party, but you guys are the problem. if you dont stop letting people think this is okay, then YOU are bringing down the rest of us, and I don't see how gaming companies are benefiting. I know plenty of men who respect me, and I know that most woman would prefer their company over the sick men game companies are attracting to their websites by using this sort of advertising campaign.

sorry, but it sickens me. I'm with the few ppl willing to tell it how it is on here!

sex

this made me laugh im like...this game has NOTHING to do with girls...WOW...WOW ima play this..WOW...-sign up- wtf!!!

but you guys are the problem.
This isn't always the case. How do you know that the only reason they are putting this advertisment up is because they have chauvanistic, sexist pigs in publishing, hmm? Also to that fact that recently there has a been a flurry of recent Alpen adverts, which are actually quite amusing. So maybe US guys aren't always the problem, maybe you should take this to Evony as opposed to complaining on a forum site.

where do i sign up!!!

lmao
the games i acutualy pretty cool once your done with the basics
but i totaly agree that the advertisements have nothing to do with the game
also its not nice because it also pops up in sites where kid usualy go to like facebook and such..

I played the game and it was okay, but nothing really special. The kids liked it, but in the end I blocked the site. The way the advertising is going, I just can't trust the people doing it not to just slip some porn into the game. Shame really, because the kids quite enjoyed it.

Actually played the game out of interest....

not naked lady in sight and full of guys who have probably never seen a a real boob

bahahahahahahahahah sad sad SAD

Ah, Evony. The nigh-inescapable ads that inspired me to finally switch to Firefox and install adblock. Notice the one with the sword poised to slide between the woman's breasts? A lot of video games these days are little more than snuff porn in disguise, and I'm afraid that most male gamers are rapists-in-waiting because of shit like this. I say this as someone that's been gaming since she was three, so believe me when I say video games are all up-skirt panty shots on underage girls, rape scenes and equally brainless playboy bunnies or saintly virgins, both of whom you are required to screw and then kill. There's probably no more dangerous toy you could give your kid.

for the moment, a new clean (by evony standards) advert can be found at

http://isohunt.com/

2 bikini clad women over a sunset/beach backdrop

I wouldnt even want to try it as the adverts for this game are ridiculous and annoying. Its like a tacky ad on TV, i would refuse to buy the item because of the advert.

I'm sure the game is decent but this marketing campaign is pathetic, perhaps its done its trick as so many people know about it but not in a positive way

I am a student studying computer games design at uni and decided to investigate Evony.com.
Just to see what some of these games are like etc. etc.
The game is actually kind of cool (found myself addicted and even spent a little money on it).
But I started to notice HUGE bandwidth use by the site as I played.
I am not the only one either, there are comments on the evony forums about this.
This is odd because all of the client info, the animations etc. are all downloaded in one big download at the start.
There is no streaming media so I began to wonder what was going on.

To cut a long story short I decided to break the law and reverse engineer Evony’s client.
Not to cheat. Not to rip them off or even to use even a scrap of the code.
But just to poke about a bit and find out what was going on, maybe even offer them some ways to improve things.

Aside from the fact that the whole thing is very poorly constructed (it is really very beginner coder level stuff. Reminds me of a lot of
what the first year students produce for assignments) it contained some very interesting information.

Included with the client are 2 peices of tracking software that monitor your web use and which applications you have open while the client is running.
These do not install independently on the machine though due to the limitations of flash and do not actually damage anything.
But they harvest massive volumes of information. My firewall was blocking a lot of outgoing transmissions and it turns out that these
were the data trying to be sent out. So they know nothing about me. lol.
However there is a LOT of data coming IN over the ports the client uses. In otherwords it is downloading something into my cache for use later.
I have bandiwdth restriction which slows these types of tricks down and I completely clear my cache every couple of hours if I am heavily using the net.

I also noticed that all the varanbles etc. are named Civony still and that there are multiple references to UMGE.
Even a couple of folders are simply called UMGE, one of these folders contains one of the spyware programs.
So I can only guess at where the data would end up if I didnt have a good firewall.

There are also commented out sections in the code which contain references to UMGE and Lam himself, though low on details.

Thank you for reading this.

Lee

There are lots of whinny people on here. Loosen up, peeps. Everyone thinks differently.

http://kinokofry.livejournal.com/217866.html

thank you, firefox + adblock =) I never see these.

Here's a new one, pretty much the same picture in the one implying female masturbation but bigger with a different layout. [IMG]http://i419.photobucket.com/albums/pp271/Day_Dream_Dimensional/evonyad.jpg[/IMG]

i love this type of advertisements..it is the way forward

What i dont understand is why they do this to boyz, this is who its goin to lets be honest, do u really think that a 10 year old girl is goin to click on that banner, no its just boys, and im thinking that most of the video games played is mainly males, so it makes sense that they are trying to advertise to them, but why this way, are they trying to make a soceity that demoralizes women, makes them seem like some kind of game, honestly im am getting sick of it and im only a 17 year old kid so i see our society making women seem more and more of an object and nothing else, and its just getting worse when they put smut like this on for kids

Wow, I can't believe it's getting so out of hand, soon it will be exactly like our comic:

http://toblender.com/comic/how-to-get-gamers-exibit-a-evony-ad-campaign/

another one

and KD if you're still reading, where the hell is your blog?

http://img193.imageshack.us/img193/8964/newevonyad.jpg

Whether you like staring at the adverts, or are terribly undignified
Evony is heard about all over the internet, Any advertisement is good advertisement? personnally, i wish we could just block these adverts, but they are flash and cant be blocked... Evony, please Die!

wow...just wow!

but it's nice still :)

Mm. I spent a good half hour reading all the comments.
To tell you the truth this doesnt actually hurt my feelings.
I am a grown women and have been seeing these advertisments all over the place. You get use to it. Yet, we shouldnt have to get use to it. These are so very uncalled for. What have we become? Seriously?..
No kid should ever come across these advertisments. I dont care whether its true or not.. Its just plain wrong. Oh and all you boys who decided to be a smartass and write "sex" or "more boobs".. You have things coming for you.
Grow the fuck up.

damn well while they are very appealing and attention drawing they are also misleading and while that last one was a joke, heres a more serious tidbit; men respond negatively to "perfect" women, all this ad achieves is a quick fapping for shallow guys and chronic masturbators :D

I found what I believe to be a counter ad to all the evony advertising. It's a side bar ad with a picture of a woman with the header "She is actually in our game, my lord"

aw snap now they're competing at least now its funny

...sigh...
A face full of boobs are fine after a long day at work, cramming, and insane drivers. But do i really want to get smacked with this for the entire day!? Heck no!!!
"...according to anaylists the Irag war seems to be...EVONY AD BOOBS!!!...going as expected. In other news..."

And for that matter, on websites that show these ads when they have absolutely nothing to do with sex. this stuff is excusable if it was at say www.SuperDooperXXX'an'p0rn'an'Fap.com, but to have it at Onemanga.com, megadownload.net, gamespot.com!!! Seriously!!!

yup yup i especially feel bad for those better websites who rely on ads and sponsorship to stay online, and these types of ads have the money to support these struggling websites, yet it makes them look bad

ugh, I see these things all the time on my own RPG forum. And it sucks. Now they move too. You see them all over the place. It's just annoying. And yeah sure you get used to it. But I live in a big family and I get embarrased when my little brother walks up behind me while I'm RPGing and one of those stupid ads shows up! They need to seriously get a new life.

These people r pathetic perverted and gross.its sick that hey use this 2 advertise

You know, its funny, but only on an actual porno site (well, a blog devoted to porn ^_^) have I seen an evony add that's actually about the game (showing scenes from the game).

It works on me because of the subliminal messaging. yea.

It wouldn't be such a bad thing if the ads were only rarely seen but they pop up everywhere, I even heard a case where some dude saw his son playing adventure quest and it had one of the more explicit evony ads on the side

how do i give a picture. ive got one which isn't already on there.

I've seen Evony ads more recently which look like the first one. Perhaps they've seen your post? :-)

im sorry but i am a man and im not like this so please include SOME
or MOST i came to this to complain also because my brother is a gamer and i caught him looking at these so please say SOME or MOST or something thx

Um i read some of these like GROW UP to men and i wan to say i agree to ur ad
saying this is rediculus but GROW UP to all men who search the internet is just plain out retarded because its the producers so next time yell
U EVONY PRODUCERS NEED TO GROW UP!!!!

or else ull just be descraced by the men who might be offended..(maybe..my freind alredy does it)

Now here is my problem with this, They can do as they wish on the net and yet for all there trouble it pays off. If i were to do anything along the same line's i would be sued for false advertising... I dont agree with how they draw the attention, However the phrase "step up or shut up" come's to mind. So you can sit here and talk about it, or you can actually do something.

I just found one today, and I took some screen caps to compile it into an .GIF animation. Not a fantastically well-done animation, but you get the idea....

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2634/4223688656_7b8aaa32af_o.gif

lol at the final Alteil ad

sadly they haven't slowed down but now I say with caution towards the kids that use the net that I've been on regular websites with ads of actual nudity, it's only a matter of time before they begin to surface everywhere.

but it's obvious that Evony marketing group and just evony in general for not removing the ads are filled with immaturity and they should do a little bit of growing up and as a gamer their ads have kept me away from even clicking them.

I saw an ad for Evony like the first one the other day. Should I send it on? I think it was on Facebook...

This is pretty wrong.

This is pretty wrong

This is wretty prong

a new one - a girl with a pink bikini on is scrolled left and right on

a new one - a girl with a pink bikini on is scrolled left and right on

I'm a girl and I'm not offended at all, only because I think its so ridiculous at this point in time that I'm convinced the Ebony marketing team is laughing along with the rest of us :P

i am 12 years old and what is this

Plants vs Zombies are spoofing them now too.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/93649-PopCaps-Evony-Spoof-Ads-for-Plants-vs-Zombies-Keep-Coming

LoL i just saw Adventure Quest Worlds is making fun of Evony it says Slay Free Quest Discreetly and a lady next to Artix is saying Pants M'Lord lol

I don't really find the ads offensive. And I'm a girl. I actually find it amusing as hell. Why? Because A LOT of the "women" used for the evony ads are actually guys who are photoshopped to LOOK like women. Isn't that just so deliously evil? That all the pubescent guys and other gullible idiots that actually sign up for the game based on the SEXY ADS. Are all being horrificaly tricked into believeing that

A). The game is actually good. Which is isn't.
B). That's it's actually free forever. Which it isn't.
C). There will be hot women in the game. Which there isn't. Because there's only corn and potatoes in the game.
D.) The "women" in the ads are real. Which they aren't. TWO of them are real. And both pics of these women were stolen by Evony. Which is probably illegal seeing as how their pics are copyrighted. All the other women are men who have photoshopped hair and boobs. Isn't that just great?!

What I find hilarious about evony is that the game is terrible. Joined up for the 7 day trial out of curiousity and boredon and guess what you get to do all day? GROW CORN. Build a castle, plant some potatoes, plant some more corn, build a castle. And spend 5 dollars everyday from either your paypal account. Everything in the game is based on a coin currency system and are used up very fast because most of the in game items are quite expensive. And you end spending hundreds of dollars everyday if you're that stupid just to buy a horse cart. Or bricks.

The guy behind the game is an evil genius at best. He was a gold miner who realized that mining for actual gold was very difficult. So instead he hired a bunch of people to create a misleading game where you grow corn all day. With ads of photoshopped men to mislead gullible guys who can't tell the difference between a real chick and a photoshopped man. Even though you can blatanly tell by the very obvious adam's apple and huge chins and very manly facial structures that most of the women have. *FACEPALM*

Damn, I can't believe I actually found some post on Google about these Evony online ads. Every day, two websites I go to always flash these damn ads in my face with half naked women and big boobies. Not that I am complaining about that, but when I visit sites for regular kicks, I don't want to be distracted by these slow scrolling ads of these babes with giant jugs.
One time, I actually signed up for the damn game. I found out the hard way that that game sucks and has absolutely nothing to do with babes. It's a dorky, half assed RPG with no real gameplay behind it.

Evony, I await the day that someone gets pissed at you guys for this misleading and over the top advertisements and does something about it. False advertising can be a crime and sticking provocative advertisements on sites where kids visit is sickening.
As for these pictures being photos of men photoshopped... well, I'm pretty good a Photoshop myself and I can't tell that any of these were guys originally. Maybe the fake animiated looking ones, but the real photographs appear to be real women. You can only go so far with Photoshop! And I can't find any youtube video showing how they transform them from guys to girls, I haven't seen that. It's possible to pull off, but I don't see it with these pictures.

Its not the fact that its mild titilation. Its more to the point that as a whole the team that created this game are sad, shallow and stupid. Don't play this piece of shit, if you want porn just google it.

people, it's called clicking on "tools" on your fucking web browsers and DISABLING "Load Images Automatically." Ain't it that simple?

Install a quick firefox addon and never see these crappy ads again! (Except for seeming them on thesocietypages.org, where they will be preserved for mockery in perpetuity).

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1865
Adblock Plus 1.1.3

I SAVED THE KINGDOM ALREADY, WHAT HAS THAT STUPID BITCH DONE THIS TIME??

crappy ppl

Nice find.

Evony does a lot more sketchy things besides their ad campaign. Check this article out as well:

http://www.brighthub.com/video-games/mmo/articles/46094.aspx

WOW ALL YOU NAGGING CHICKS ARE JUST BOYCOTTING THIS CAUSE YOU'RE ALL FAT F-UGLY B1TCHES...
THESE GIRLS ARE HOT, AND MORE OF THEM IS NEEDED...DOWN WITH UGLY CHICKS N' BRING ON THE BOOBIES!!!!!!!!

Personally, I don't agree with their marketing strategy because of the fact that the ads totally fail to portray what the game is really about.
Even though the ads are disrespectful to women, as long as they work to get more users, they'll keep on using them.
Lets face it, the internet is full of these kinds of ads, and some actually lead to the real explicit stuff. It would be nice to have a cleaner safer internet browsing experience. The virtual world still remains with little regulation which is why anyone can access anything, until that changes not much can be done. Except keep away from what doesn't appeal to us.

... can i haz cheeseburger?

Wow!!!
The Early comments in this thread are just astounding. Holy Crap... Neither the men OR the Women who have posted here are innocent. I mean sure, It pisses me off that Evony is doing a bunch of false advertising, but When someone makes a comment about something that I don't agree with, I'm not going to sit there and resort to name calling etc. I mean the following is just childish, and is simply copied and pasted. Seriously grow up people, and I mean both men AND women:

captain kief 11:49 pm on February 9, 2010 | # | Reply

how is this so wrong? you act like sexually oriented advertising is being pioneered by the eggheads at evony. This isn’t some new degradation of the female form, its a continuation of modern advertising.

“No kid should ever come across these advertisments…its just plain wrong”

what is wrong about sexuality? the only reason we fear our children seeing nudity is because we’re playing to the social dogmas that have been repeated through time. if no one told a kid what they were seeing was wrong it would remain a natural human experience, rather than some maniacal crime against youth. it’s only wrong because you tell them it is.

“You have things coming for you.
Grow the fuck up.”
thats like telling a woman to stop spouting her pointless and petty everyday overly exaggerated bitch drama

*
Shannon 10:06 am on February 10, 2010 | # | Reply

Okay, first of all, you are probably some typical male with that typical male behavior, which is completely repulsive and unattractive. Secondly, just because you are a typical male who portrays typical male point of view on this situation doesnt mean the women here are typical bitchy drama queens. Thirdly, being a women I will tell any women on this earth that it is wrong and stupid to be a typical female who bitches and gossips and creates drama just as I am telling the immature guys to grow up on this matter. And there is nothing wrong with sexuality. But just like health class, they give you a choice if you want your kids learning about it in school or not, some parent prefer to talk with them privately, not have them bombarded with these images on the internet, they could get the wrong impression. And another thing, just because nudity has been social dogmas doesnt mean it is appropriate to display now, things have changed since ancient times. Just because people did something in history doesnt mean we have to repeat it. Todays society is obviously corrupt and distorted with all of this sex appeal and photoshopped pictures of women pressuring young girls to become anorexic, and bulemic when almost every picture is FAKE. And yes I know that many other ads advertise using sex appeal and I am not singling this one out, all of it is disgusting. Anyone who actually buys a product just because there is a slutty female being sexually portrayed is a serious pervert and needs to grow up.
o
captain kief 12:31 pm on February 10, 2010 | # | Reply

Wow I thought you might be able to handle this argument with some measure of levity and composure but you’re clearly incapable of spewing ignorance and disrespect. Occams razor cuts both ways, and your blaming of men is pathetic. enjoy your life of no dick and late night chocolate ice cream, ya bop ass trick
o
Michael 3:28 pm on February 10, 2010 | # | Reply

The ‘typical male’ you say? Hmm… Isn’t that a bit sexist? Men enjoy women. GET OVER IT. How do you think you were born? YOUR DAD FUCKED YOUR MOM. BECAUSE HE ENJOYED HER BODY. Calling it disgusting to be a ‘typical male’ is just stupid. Do you get pissed at a wolf when it bites? “Oh fuck you wolf! You’re just being a typical wolf, biting everyone that gets near you!” Telling men that they’re disgusting for liking tits it telling us not to exist. You do realize that everything you said is pointing out that you ARE a typical bitch? You’re a drama queen, freaking out at men for doing what we like. Next time you touch yourself, next time you eat chocolate, next time you have sex, you’re disgusting for doing what you like. Grow up, please. I’m sick of morons like you telling me I’m not allowed to do what all men do and look at women. I agree the ads are stupid, having women that aren’t even in the game, but it’s by no means disgusting.
+
Shannon 7:53 pm on February 11, 2010 | #

Okay when the fuck did I say men can’t enjoy women? You are exaggerating my argument. THere is a difference between fucking and making love to someone. If you don’t love them, I don’t understand why you are having sex with them, thats all. I mean, sex is a very personal and intimate experience and it is being took advantage of in the media and such by using sex appeal to get people to play a stupid game. That is the whole point of this argument. It’s wrong. And how am I a drama queen just because I choose to speak my opinion on a situation I feel strongly about? Everyone should feel comfortable expressing their opinions. And even though I don’t agree with your opinion, I respect it anyway. But I am standing by my word 100% when I say that being a typical male is disgusting, truly. Typical men have no respect for women which I do not agree with.

Ahahaha, my dear shannon. I'm a WOMAN. But good job in further proving your stupidity by assuming that I'm a dude. My name is Seliny19. Yea. Very manly there. FACEPALM. And I'm not being biased at all. I'm simply showing things in an even way. MEN AND WOMEN BOTH EQUALLY HAVE HARD LIVES. But you can't seem to understand this because you're a feminazi. And all fmeinazis ever do is blame MEN for everything. And think that all men are pigs. Which isn't true. There are plenty of great and nice guys out there. You're just too stuck in your tiny little world full of whining and drama that you never gave yourself to get out of your bubble and find yourself a guy who ISN'T a jerk. There are jerks and assholes in both genders. Somthing you obviously cannot understand because of your self proclaimed pain of being a woman.

I personally hate my fellow women who blame men for everything. Seriously who the fuck are you to STEREOTYPE ALL MEN IN THE WORLD?! Bigotry is wrong. It's just as bad as racism. If you my dear have the right to say that ALL MEN are pigs and that they're all disgusting and that all of them use women. Then all the guys on here bashing you have the right to badmouth YOU and say that you're just a typical bitch. All guys are typical disguting males to you right? Then you're just another drama queen bitch to them. SEE? It's FAIR. You can't expect to INSULT someone for no reason then not expect to get crticism in return.

Do you think that stereotyping is right and just my sweet? Because it seems that you do. You're just another chick with the victim mentality. I usually don't take sides in arguments. But for this once I will. I may be a girl but I side with guys on this one. Because you're purposely pushing them down for no reason at all. Most of the dudes on here don't even find the evony ads attractive. Have you even read their comments? Some of them are even defending women saying that the ads are demeaning. But you probably didn't even read any of THOSE comments. And you continue to badger and hound them for no reason.

As for your whole fucking argument about stupid teenage girls being swayed and brainwashed by the media. Who fucking cares? Good for them. I have absolutely no pity for the weak minded and weak willed. And actually both teenage girls and boys are affected by the media. Stop acting like only girls get affected by this. You're being way too biased. Boys ARE indeed pressured to act certain ways and have to look certain ways JUST LIKE GIRLS. I already stated all the hardships guys have to go through much more then girls in an earlier post which you replied to in a hilariously epic fail way.

I don't care for spoiled little girls that think they're too skinny, or that they're too fat, or need to look like this or that. That's their fault for being naive and gullible. Not MEN'S fault. Growing up I never had any damn bitchy issues about how I looked or if boys liked me. Because I don't give two shits about shallow appearances. If a guy thought I was hot. Good for him. If a guy thought I was ugly good for him. I didn't care. If a guy thought I was attractive and wanted to have sex with me. Good for him. I didn't care. I dressed how I wanted to, kept to myself, and focused on what was more important to me in life.

And the fact that you think that society is corrupted because of sex appeal ads. Then you've once again proven yourself to be stupid. There are so many things that are messed up in the world. But fucking ads that use sex appeal?! LMFAO. That's probably the least important thing in the world. But to typical feminazis like you it's: OMG SUPER IMPORTANT!!!! It's women like you that make intelligent, rational women look bad. Because of women like you there will NEVER be a Female President. Because there are waaaay to many women like you. That freak out about the most stupid and insignificant things. When there are much more important things to FREAK OUT about.

Not to metion I've already proven that all the Evony Images are FAKE in an earlier post. About how all the images are all stolen images of guys from porn sites and then photoshopped into looking like women. So your argument is moot. Because you've pretty much been defending gay guys this whole time. How does it feel my dear? To have so passionately debated about a topic you've so wholefully defended. Only to be sticking up for MEN? Seeing as how the evony ads are photoshopped guys. And NOT women at ALL. You've been arguing for the exploitation of gay men. Do you want a cookie now for pointlessly defending the wrong gender?

Why is it that women always have more to say then men? Lol. You girls crack me up.

Simply put.

Everyone has different moral values and see things differently.

Seliny19 Believes they are Gay men, photoshopped, While Shannon and other misc people think they are all Females.

I think its just best we all agree to disagree that Evony, Right or wrong, should just find a different way of advertising because its false advertising.

Why not do both eh? Half Naked women and Half Naked guys? That way its fair =)

Chocobrain: LOL holy crap I can't believe how everyone seems to be uncharacterizing me. It's crazy haha. :) But ONCE AGAIN. I am not stereotyping that every girl is a slut and every guy is disgusting. OBVIOUSLY every individual is different. Jeez. ANd I am not hatefilled just because I am against porn and perverted guys! I mean its not like I am trying to judge anyone, I apologize for coming off as a bitch but its a heated debate and I got carried away. But the point of this is that Evony is violating the law with false advertising and possibly stealing pics (if they aren't photoshopped) I think this argument was blown way out of proportion.

Seliny what does me being young have to do with anything? I am 18 years old and have seen things in my life. If I have an opinion about something, I just have an urge to express it which is why I came to this site. If you didn't have an interest on this topic, why did you google the evony ads?

Are you a role player Seliny? Is that why you are a photoshop junkie? Just curious..

Seliny I agree with you to the extent that I can't do anything about it. I understand that Sex has been used in advertising for years, that doesn't make it right or okay though. Murder and Rape has been a crime for years but it doesn't make it okay. I know your thinking "well thats completely different and more serious". But I believe that it is porn and sexual advertising that makes a huge difference when it comes to crazy psycho-paths who look at it and makes them want to rape a girl or whatever. I mean this is what our society has been reduced to. Its a serious concern, girls and boys of all ages, shapes, and sizes being raped and killed. I hope I never grow out of feeling this way towards the subject as I get older. I firmly believe in one thing that you don't, it doesn't make you right or me right. Its an opinion. I hate when people dont have an open mind and just assumes they are right just because they are older or whatnot. I am entitled to my opinion. These arent facts we are speaking, its our opinions. I wish you could just respect my opinion and have an open mind about this.

I've used photoshop enough to know how to do crap like that and its highly unlikely. I pulled up youtube to actually see if Evony had done so and the search results came up negative. So give me a link to that youtube video. And Shannon, False Advertising only applies to the United States of America that I know of. Since they are Chinese based, they can do whatever the hell they want, like they've always been doing. Posting up half naked women on evony....slowly killing off its enemies with lead infested toys....ect. You get the picture.

So yeah. Boo on them its really all about money. If they want to go down in The world records as being the gayest game on earth let em. People send hundreds of dollars just to play that stupid game. I just pray a team of Assassins Kills them all =)

Dude, I play guitar so everytime I look up a tab or something and then click on the page from google, there's like evony ads all ofver the place. There's always chicks bending over half naked... not that I didn't like it ;D but i thought the thing was a porn game so I satyed away and then my friend said he'd been playin that game for a while and that it's basically the same thing as runescape. They're just using sex as ads.

Found this one where the chick's boobs just glow on and off. Ridiculous. http://i49.tinypic.com/qou89v.png

Q : Why they show sexy boobs? A : Cuz they like to attract people to play the shitty game.

saw this one, It doesn't even state the game name, but it leads to evony...

http://i50.tinypic.com/ipo5n7.jpg

Where're KD and Bagelsan when you need them?

I am disturbed and alarmed by some of the "discussion" on this board. Troll city. This comment board could be of use, I suppose, in highlighting the inability of many to have rational and respectful arguments about representation and stereotypes.

I can't believe the moderators haven't removed the abusive and somewhat triggering tirades that are evident on this page.

"Verbally raping" people's arguments? Are you shitting me?

http://img222.imageshack.us/img222/5001/evony.png

This is bullshit. I go to leave a comment with a couple links and it won't even show up. People, I found a new ad, want me to post about it? I guess not.

I have to agree with Shannon on this. Yes, I like girls. No, I don't think they should be half naked on every webpage on the internet. And I don't care what you people say, I don't believe children should be exposed to this. It doesn't matter if it causes you to rape someone or not. IT IS IMMORAL. What's sad is I actually used to play this game. It's rather fun. But when their ads came out, it really just ruined the game for me. And something tells me I'm not the only one to feel this way. I can't actually see these ads helping them.

I have to agree with Shannon on this. Yes, I like girls. No, I don't think they should be half naked on every webpage on the internet. And I don't care what you people say, I don't believe children should be exposed to this. It doesn't matter if it causes you to rape someone or not. IT IS IMMORAL. What's sad is I actually used to play this game. It's rather fun. But when their ads came out, it really just ruined the game for me. And something tells me I'm not the only one to feel this way. I can't actually see these ads helping them

ah, i get it! there are no men in this game! then those make sense...

I really don't like how Evony does this. It's not only misleading, but I, personally, find it somewhat sexist. Do you ever see ads with nude men? I sure haven't, but I think it would be a nice thing to see. Not because I like men, but because, for once, the media wouldn't be sexualizing women.

I like how everyone refers to moral or immoral without having defined a basis for moral absolutes. Obviously, you don't know what morality actually is. Your morality is relative: subjective. It's called relativism. If your culture accepts human sacrifice to a sun god for productive corn crops, then that's moral. Analogy, don't take me out of context. Your moral absolutes are relative to your culture. That's your definition of morality: relativism. You should frame your opinions within the framework of relativism. "I believe that this is wrong because I am a relativist and my culture deems it inappropriate." Otherwise, you're just a babbling idiot who likes to hear itself rant about its groundless opinions. So first, settle on a basis for moral absolutes, which you don't have. Then argue about morals, which you absolutely cannot you groundless, immoral, relativist.

Just another example of how men still rule this world...

Man, this ad campaign just blows my mind. I notice the grammar is starting to fall apart, too ("come play my lord"?)

I am very upset too!! Blah Blah Blah .... However, I am upset for a different reason. I have been playing Evony, and will continue to play.. Because I could careless what others think. It upsets me that all these ads were out there, and I never saw them before. So, now I keep searching the Evony maps for a trail leading to to a woman who asked me to play? I cant seem to find her... Apparently Evony has done an amazing job of clouding my thoughts with scantily clad women, and I say carry on Evony. If you don't like it don't play. Who are you to pass judgment on how a company advertises?

Read how Evony (Reagan Mercantile) is stealing your money for a supposedly free game.

http://screwevony.freeforums.org/

I tried Evony, and have to say I didn't care for it. i started playing before i saw any ads (involving scantily clad women or otherwise) and found it boring...I find the reactions and controversy to these ads interesting. Firstly, sex sells! It's been proven over and aver again. So I don't really see how Evony is any different from beer commercials, for example. Some people have been claiming it's porn, and whether or not that's true, people can't seem to figure if porn is right or wrong. I believe, that on a purely moral level it is wrong...though having said that, I have to admit i watch porn myself. I don't try to tell anyone what they should or shouldn't do, but for women to say it is exploitative to the female sex, but not to the male sex is, well, incorrect. Men are just as naked as women, and just as likely to be watched (and lusted over).
O.K....so sex sells. But there is no sex in Evony, as far as I could tell. People (mostly guys) claim it is false advertising, but Evony makes no overt claims that what you are clicking on will display nearly nude women...so, not actually false advertising.
So, Porn is wrong, but i watch it? Am I a hypocrite? No. I'm a legal adult who is capable of making his own decisions, and if I or any one else wants to do sonething..ANYTHING....then I believe we should be free to do it; so long as it doesn't unnecessarily harm anyone else. Now, you could argue that enabling the exploitation of people by watching porn is harmful....but to whom? I certainly don't think that any of the porn I've watched involved people who were forced into it, and from what i understand, some porn stars make a very respectable amount of money.
I think that sex and sexy images (and I've seen those that cater to women, too!) are here to stay, and as long as men and women feel sexual desire, that's never gonna change. I do think that there is too much exposure out there....any one with any brains at all can find it, and that includes children. I mean come on...porno is an act, real sex doesn't happen that way. But while I agree that porn does not contribute to rape etc, I do think that younger people can develop an unrealistic attitude towards sex.
Having said all that, I have to say that while the images in the Evony ads are provocative, I do not consider them porn. While they leave less to the imagination than other ads, I consider them no worse than beer commercials...really, if a young person wanted to see half naked men or women, they could pick up a catalogue and flip to the underwear section! Which perhaps goes to my earlier statement, and the sight of flesh, naked or almost so, is so prevalent that we just accept it, or become numb to at least the majority of sexy images, be they in beer commercials, billboards, or even catalogues. It's a societal norm now, and whether or not you agree with it I don't think it's going to change. So really the only option any of us have is to make our own decision....Don't watch it if you have a problem with it, and if you don't have a problem with it, fine, but at least be discreet!

The People VS. Evony case in now open at AllRise online court. Join the debate and cast your vote - http://bit.ly/AllRise286

evony can suck a big one thar adds do nuthing with wut thay show someone shood report them to the F.B.I for fals addvertising and im not joking

To everyone who's all like, "OMFG THIS OBJECTIFIES WOMEN", I would just like to point out that I'm pretty sure everyone does a little objectifying of everyone. And why shouldn't they? Can't you think someone is hot? I think it's stupid to blame males for 'objectifying women' based on the evony ads (even if they are ridiculous, hahahaha). Lesbians are just as capable of objectifying women, and woman are just as capable of objectifying men! And hey, if these ads are what works for the people who made Evony to get people to play their game, then good for them! If nothing else, at least Evony ads make me LOL. 8D

jeez people, this article isnt about an argument about all this stuff! it's just about evony and the stupid adds for it. i dont see how those ads help though, as soon as someone logs into it they find out what its about, they leave forever.

though the "it makes you feel like a king!" thing is funny to me.

I don't like evony, false advertising on kid safe sites.

Well, all i can say is that a lot of kids get the wrong idea with these advertisements parade around. Ya, sure, you might not care, but who the f*ck are you (please, this is a parental issue, leave this to the big boys)? I disagree with the advertisement of sexual provoking images ON websites meant for kids.

These ads make me laugh out loud every time. I can't even take them seriously.

Also, there's a few other ads floating around that poke fun at the Evony ones. I recall one for some cartoon MMO or another captioned "You can play indiscreetly", with a funny animation... I can't grab a screenshot at the moment, but rest assured it's out there.

these are clearly adult content ads targeting children

Those guys at Evony have humour lol, they have absolutely no boundaries and they don't give a fuck. But for real, those ads are getting annoying.

Some todler's mother seems to like spamming these comments with her pro-censorship idealism. It's not that the ads are provocative, it's that they're misleading. The game itself sucks, and is certainly not "adult themed" or whatever you want to call it.

Anyone else hoping that they don't start making TV ads?

I think it's absolutely hilarious that I found a copy of the porno they took the cover girls off of in my FYE store today, while helping a customer.

The ad they used it for was the Dec. '09 ad, man talk about straight up copyright infringement! All they did was just change the background to the sun setting in the background on water from the actual porno cover. That's just sad.

evony is such a stupid game whichhas nothing to do with women, or actually seeing images in game play, they just use ads like these to attract the common horny teen, and adults, and many fall for it. then getting "hooked" to the game it self spending tons of money to get an edge. very smart on thier part, very stupid depending on the people who actually fall for this money hungry game. DON"T BE VICTIM!

In the Madison Avenue game, sex sells. Advertisers have always known this. So your ads for whiter teeth, cars, liqueurs all have subliminal sex that hooks you all the time it pretends that it isn't there. But it is, and you'll find it when you start looking a little deeper behind the items being 'sold'. Magazines don't have sexy chicks on their covers for nothing; motorcycles don't have babes in hot pants leaning across the seats just for fun. Advertisers know that they need to make an ad appealing and sex does that faster than anything.
Evony cuts through all the bullshit and all the pretense. Evony hit, with genius, the ultimate target of all Madison avenue. Sex sells, and you don't even need to try to sell the product in your ad. Amazing. Genius. And the real genius is, they didn't have to wean the public to it gradually. Almost overnight they went to ads that had nothing to do with a game and everything to do with bobbing boobs. http://full-rapidshare.com/uploads/160x600_1.html

It seems people don't realize the abstract concept of a slippery slope. Just look at the moral degradation of society today. Anyone who doesen't support full blown hedonism is a "religious nut" or a "conservative" in the stereotypical negative connotations of the word. The general population has become so jaded it's down right scarey, and what are the positive effects of this moral relativism? New markets? Why is rampant hedonism such a noble cause in the eyes of the "liberal"? I'd like to mention the SAW movieseries, which started out at a psychologically chilling flick and ended up as a exploitational gorefest revolving around killing other people in ways that hasnt yet been seen on the silver screen. The first one had content and a message, the subsequent ones did not. I mention this because SAW is an exellent example of the slippery slope. And what of our kids? Our kids would pick up were we left off, meaning, when it's they're turn to "liberalise" it would mean further degradation of an alredy degraded starting point. Just imagine how "Saw 10" or "Saw 15" would look like.... Im writing this because i was watching the movie "The Road" yesterday and today i was philosophying weather or not i would decend to caniibalism and such, like most of the people in that movie. My conclusion was ofcourse that i would not, because im would know better, or even die rather than live like that. Earlier tonight i was surfing on the internet and thought i'd check out some porn, then it hit me, the reality of that film, and how i, given the ease in which i watch and get off at other peoples misery, would probably prey on others like the people in that film, because im doing it now, even though its not motivated by need, but by want, or desire. If desire makes me suport such evils as the porn industry, why do i think i would not, driven by need, support such a thing as cannibalism. It hit me how degraded i had become, and how my morals and principles had been compromised in the most profound way. I have become a corrupt individual, because society tells me that it's ok. "Liberals" like Jonathan argues that it's up to the individual, but on the other hand he's quick to label those who disagrees as some kind of stereotype whos oposed to freedom.
Freedom is an abstract term. I want freedom from the bombardment of unethical advertisements that applies scientific methods in the practice of manipulation. Theres even a a whole new field of marketing designed at targeting children. I want my children to be free of that. How can you argue that it's the individuals choice, when the individual gets advertisement spoon fed from the cradle to the grave. It's manipulation and it's uninhibited.

"If we continue down this road, we're going to end up where we're headed"

New found:

http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/images/evony-ad-3.jpg

http://www.bargainmoose.ca/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/Evony.jpg

Found this the other day. Unsure if it's made by the same company or not, but it's copying the ad style as well.

http://i39.tinypic.com/mrb6d.jpg

Keita, WOrld of LordCraft is, IIRC, run by the same company but it's not the same game.

my problem isn't the whole "obscene" thing. i don't care about that. my problem is that it's misleading. there's never a situation like that in evony. it's just a ploy. so in conclusion... these ads are immoral because they lie.

Incase anyone hasn't noticed Evony seriously does take its ads from porno magazines, not only do they steal their ads from other sources but they also simply used "save image as" on several other advertisements from other companies for their ingame avatars (such as DAZ 3D Productions). The game itself is somewhat sloppy and amazingly slow paced but is a good way to waste time. I do like playing the game despite my critism but i'm shocked the company hasn't been sued out of business.

For fuck sakes, people! It is NOT false advertising. The site does not overtly claim that there is provocative images in this game, nude or otherwise. Are the ads misleading? Yes, but only because the ad creators know how to attract attention. A hot woman, scantily clad or nude? OF COURSE any hetero, red-blooded male is going to look more closely at the image, and hope to see more of the same. Does that make us pigs? Maybe, maybe not, but the male brain is hardwired that way, AND EVONY KNOWS IT! It cannot really be called false advertising however, because as I said earlier, there are no OVERT claims, written or otherwise, which say you will encounter pics of hot women on the site. Every ad I've seen says "click to join" NOT "click to see hot chicks". If anyone logs onto the site looking for provocative images, it is through hope of seeing more, NOT because the ad promises more. Evony knows that the majority of men who see the sexy ads are going to HOPE to see more, BUT THEY DO NOT PROMISE IT!!!!! Misleading advertising? In a very real way, I think yes. But FALSE advertising? In the strictest sense, I've gotta say NO. Don't agree with me? Jump onto your search engine and find the definition of false advertising. Still don't believe me? Go back to school and re-educate yourself. STILL don't believe me? Take a long walk along a short pier---you might as well, you're all wet anyway.

Greetings;
I am hosting a petition to remove Evony's ads from the web. Please join me in my fight against this obscene and disguesting advertising ploy. Follow the link below to sign the petition and ad your voice! It will only take a moment.
http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/RemoveEvonys0bsceneAds

How about you all just shut the fuck up? Jesus, it's a comment box, not some open end debate.

Objectification aside (and admit it, hot shirtless guys sell ungodly amounts of merchandise to women), I am more offended as a man. Offended FOR men, really. I am probably horribly misguided, but I'm straight-up insulted by these ads. How stupid do they think we are? There's a difference between marketing porn and marketing games. Sometimes they overlap, yeah, but I feel this inexplicable rage when I see these ads--like the Evony marketers think I am a pathetic meathead who can't enjoy anything if nobody's baring skin. I know they aren't pointing it at me in particular, but that's how I react to bad advertising. I've never played the game, because I like games made for gamers, but I never will because clearly the game has nothing to offer if this is what they resort to. It's like selling a car based on nothing more than a killer bass system.

Maybe there are more idiots out there than I like to think. Probably lots of dudes fall for this. Nobody I know though. Thank God. It's marketed to gullible idiots, and props to Evony for ensuring that their player base is comprised of losers and half-wits.

First off, I would like to give Eagle poop a pat on the back. Then I would like to ask myself: WHY THE @#$! ARE THESE EVONY LOSERS PUTTING GIRS IN THIER UNDERWEAR ALL OVER THE INTERNET!?! :(

*_*

I have another question: Why is everyone arguing about an online game add? It's just pointless! :( :( :(

The internet IS for porn. We don't give a damn about MMOs anymore..

..where did those days go?

I've seen adverts for this game all over the internet displaying women, which from the looks of it were nothing to do with the game in question. Which led me to typing "Why do evony adverts show women" into google which led me here.

I've never felt tempted at all to play this game, although I can be described as a gamer. It obviously isn't a good game if the only thing they think that they can sell their game with is skimply dressed women. I'm not sure how simple minded you have to be to think "omg boobs I think i'll go and have a look at this game!"

I think its hilarious lololololololololololololol and plenty more lol

Oh, yeah, and here are a few obvious parodies from Plants vs. Zombies.

images.lazygamer.co.za/2009/08/popcapEvony1.jpg

http://americancopywriter.typepad.com/.a/6a00d8341ce32a53ef0120a50128eb970b-800wi

http://a4.vox.com/6a00cd9718b8164cd50123de12d20c860c-500pi

Hmm, I've seen quite a few of these. I remeer hat I actually had a mind to try it with the very very first ad I saw (the top one), but went to a new page, saw another, and decided against it. They need to understand that men do not blindly follow cleaveage or boobs...
Really.

About the jan 2010 updtae... all I can say is OMFG.
I thought that ad was for some random mobile phone subscription >.>

See, it's not that I'm AGAINST scantily clad women in advertising, heck no... It's just Evony advertising this way is like Pokemon advertising by showing pictures of a huge musclebound guy in torn denim shorts holding rifles...

That and the ads begin to have less and less to do with Evony as the campaign goes on, ah well, at the very least it's something to laugh at, and something for Popcap to help us laugh at :P

*cough*

After reading a reply from an administrator on the Evony forums to a thread now locked and abandoned, it seems that towards the end of the message he's claiming that Evony/Civony is not creating or publishing any of the ads below the first. But the mystery remains..who is?

Reading further on, he seems to say that who's really causing all of this is a dating website. However, they're doing it with their support. He doesn't apologize for the fact.

Briefly before, members began saying they had tossed a flurry of private messages towards the admins and mods, and posted their replies as well.

All of the replies seemed to go off-topic after the first sentence, and instead began focusing on how 'great' the game and community was. As a matter of fact, the game itself is, for the most part, riddled with glitches for some people (in some cases, some in-game objects have been known to dissapear--you don't get a refund, BTW) and, thanks to the adverts, many of the members of the game community are prone to talking about, shall we say...suggestive stuff. Not saying it's horrible, but it's not going to be on my list anytime soon.

And some additional information; once you're greeted with the register screen, the one that requests your 'Nice name', password, and email, you're automatically directed to the game. Weird, huh.

Women were created by the Lord Jesus Christ himself to serve men

Funny. I am a MMORPG addict, and it's difficult to find games where you can create good female characters. But this particular game never appealed to me. I know now why XD

Its gotten to the point where i am embarrassed to visit FML, since they are sponsored by Evony. I have actually seen most of the later ones, and have to scroll down quickly to view a page.

I got in trouble when i was on... i think xat, cant remember. my grandparents thought i was on a porn site...

When the ad was just a soft-focus fantasy babe making a sex face with the caption "play now, my lord," I was a little squicked out by the connotations. Now that the ads are straight up lingerie models, not even trying to look like they have anything to do with the game, I find it too over-the-top and absurd to be offensive. It's just so lazy. Tons of fantasy games, movies and books rely on hot fantasy babes to get sales. The whole warrior in a chainmail bikini thing. But Evony's advertisers aren't even trying to make the cheesecake they're using to lure in nerds look fantasy themed anymore. It's amazing and kind of sad.

to all those who are worried about the kids, all I have to say is back up a second, the training begins at home and if you are so naive to think that what you had to say as a parents does not matter then sorry for your loss. don't have a computer at home then, I bet you do, stop being afraid of what they might see, you cannot hold their hand 24/7/365. All we can do is try to keep alive what our parents and grandparents TRIED, and I mean TRIED to teach us as we grew up. We all find our own path, we can only hope it's a good path, but never give up trying to teach!

I've heard some very bad things about this game. The fact that they just take pictures of hot women from various sources without permission is bad enough, but they just seem to think everybody's stupid enough to fall for their bullcrap. There are no sexually appealing damsels in distress in that game. In fact, I'd be surprised if there were any women at all in it. Worse still, I've heard talk about them harvesting massive amounts of data from the computers of those who play this game. Yeah. I strongly suggest that everyone just stay the hell away from this one.

I don't really care how good or bad the game is, I just like looking at their tits lol

Might have escaped people's attention but these Ads are NOT created by Evony. Has anyone ever considered that it could be the affiliate program that is responsible for these ads. People get paid for referring people to Evony. It is THOSE people who are creating these ads because THEY are the ones that think advertising "porn" will generate more signups/clicks for which they get paid.

I am an Evony player and I signed up after seeing a REAL evony advert on Facebook.

Up until a few months ago I had assumed that those ads were the equivalent of the 'shoot the duck' ones from a long time ago, fake games or porn that would install malware in your computer. You can't imagine my utter surprise to learn that this was an actual game.

lol...too desperate

I actually play this game, I have to say I do find it fun, but the ads are just taking the whole sex-image marketing concept a step too far, I mean the girls are very nice and the laddish side of me enjoys the images (yes I admit to having a side to me that enjoys this kind of thong) but I just find this stupid, for one thing once you've signed up for the game the delicious looking ladies are no-where to be found and secondly this kind of game could be marketed really easily without semi-nudity.
I used to play a game called Travian, slightly simpler graphics but the game concept was exactly the same and they regularly have extremely busy servers showing that they're doing pretty well through simple banner ads, they manage this without busty period dressed women, de-robing women or even de-robed women, the ad campaign evony exhibits is unnecessary although the fact that we're discussing it is surely evidence in itself that the ads are eye-catching if nothing more and that is the purpose of an ad campaign.

A word of warning, though I have not confirmed this myself I have been warned by multiple individuals that I trust that the thing is largely a spyware program that allows people to play while it farms for data. I would suggest that people avoid this and only use it with the utmost caution.

Personally, I'd play the game if there WASN'T a mostly naked woman on the advert. I happen to LIKE these sorts of game, and while I also like women in various state of undress, unless these women appear in the game or have some bearing on it, they have no place on the ads.
I came across the first and second ads, and was severely tempted to sign up, then opened another tab while I filled in the sign up form, caught sight of the mostly naked ladies, and changed my mind.

Way to lose players, guys, even if it's not actually evony themselves who made to softcore-porn ads. I can say this as a woman myself, so you can't even accuse me of sexism against the adverts, or something stupid like that.

Looks like they're focusing on representing their game in the ads now.

As Daniel Floyd would say, this is an embarrasment to the medium. There's nothing I can say that would illuminate how idiotic this is.

ive played this evony game (i saw the first add when i clicked on it) its a fun game for what it is, but seriously, if you dont think that what you made is going to get people to play your game and you need half naked women to sell your game, someting is wrong with you, its just sad how far down they went.

This is very sexist to women around the world. Evony should have stopped at the first add but no, they had to be a d1c about this and decide to go straight to a down right cleavage campaign. If they can't find a new type of way to market adds for their gaming, then they must be out of their freaking mind. somebody, and i dont mean me, should sue those idiots for even thinking of this campaign. this is incredebly rude to everyone arounds the globe and i feel that this may be the beginning of how our children will get sucked into porn. this is a stupid way to advertise their game. and the add where it asks to change body parts?! i almost chucked my frekin laptop out the window. it was so rude and sexist! if u play this game, i suggest u stop or face the eiminent (i think that's how you spell it) consequences. this game will hopefully be shut down soon and we can all turn to the main topic. i was scrolling down a website and saw an evony ad the first one with the guy with a sword. I clicked. 2 weeks later i saw the next one. i ignored. then the next came out and i saw the current result from a mile away. im not trying to b1tch about it but it should be put to a stop. I think that this is a small thing compared to the big picture. I was doing a project for my work and searched "curious" because we had to fand a pic for curiousity. if u ever searched that, hidden in all of the curious george pics are some very rude pics featuring women/children being in curiosity category when the might as well be in the porn or porn related joke category. Ever wonder on how to get rid of them? see that button that says report rude pics? click it and frekin report those pics! get rid of them. it is a fact that more than 80% of all pics are porn or sex related. if it would be put to a stop, we can save our children, grandchildren, and on from the threat that porn poses on the internet. 94.7% of all children use the internet. they evidently see the pics. they like them. they cant help it. they get sucked into a raging vortex of nudity and porn and never get out. then when they get to be adults, they need to pick a career. they think "oh, i remember i used to like this and....." before u know it u got another porn creator on the internet. i know u think "oh, 1 little man cant be that bad can it?" well, one little man made all the evony adds! and think. out of millions of those people! we need to put a stop to this to save the world from a porn filled life.

All you need to sell somthing is boobies/abs!

Interesting that this article doesn't even mention what the game itself is about. Victim of its marketing, too. :(

I wonder how many people tried the game because of this article.

this is one of my PET PEEVES!!!! i hate when objectified female bodies are thrown into situations that seem have nothing to do with women!!! a good exmple of this is cheerleader what the hell are nfl/nba cheerleaders for and why are they all female. this type of sexism really erks me! it would be one thing if they had strong respectable female characters but even if they did doesnt their objectification ie "fuckability" counteract that respectability???

I saw one once for a real-time strategy game (you know, without any detailed characters, and definitely without any breasts) that just said straight-up "Are you 18+ enough to play?" Funniest ad I've ever seen.

It's a shame that people think anyone who likes fantasy games are a bunch of immature douchebag-y boys, when in reality there are just as many female players as male. Sexism is alive and well on the internet, it seems.

I think it is exciting to play games like Evony but on the other hand it is not good for women to be shown in this style. This is just a game and not a reality. We should rather focus on living a real life than having a "virtual girlfriend". But is is just my opinion. I like action games such as Cactus McCoy - http://gamelicker.com/arcade-game-cactus-mccoy-952 and do not fancy those virtual friend games very much.

WTF IS THIS SHIT?

I smell des-spir-aaaaaate!

For the longest time I ignored those Evony ads, assuming the game was some kind of 3D sex simulation deal or possibly a takeoff on those explicit Japanese dating/sexual assault sims.  I was surprised to find out from other online articles that it was just a shitty third-tier Age of Empires/Civilization ripoff, with no boobs to be found.  For shame.

A new mmo browser game company has started copying Evony's strategy.  The game itself is comparable to the old school 'Tibia' only with poorer graphics, and it's a browser game, and...it's turn based.  But add cleavage to the ads and everyone wants to play it for a few seconds.

link to ad screenshot: http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/856/moreevonyaddishness.jpg/

I LOVE ADDS THERE BEAST THE LAsT ONE MADE ME PLAY IT A GOOD GAME WITH BOOBS

This is disgusting. I wish men were sexualised in these ways so they would see that it really is a big deal and that women are totally justified to be livid about this!

 Love how they get mocked by OTHER game ads. XD

I really wish cracked hadn't linked to this website.... because it is going to bring in a lot of people who will try to find reasons to argue with everything here. : / 

The women in the ads don't seem to mind. Why should you?

I WISH that men would be objectified and worshipped like women are!  I WISH men could go to the bar/club, wearing sexy clothes, and be guaranteed sex that night.  You bitches have it easy...stop your complaining and enjoy the attention.

I LOVE CRACKED, Great article

with all you arguing about how its objectifying and such, well of course it is, i dont have a problem with that the only problem i have is that it is misleading, as for objectifying women i think that those women simply objectified themselves by agreeing to do the ads for the game

So...has any actually played the damn game?

Honestly, this article made me laugh--and then it made me feel good to be a feminist and an educated individual. It made me realize that there are people out there who can see straight through an ad's "sex appeal," and at least one person with enough initiative to show others how ridiculous it is.

Plus, the desperation behind cutting to the "good bits" (as in example 8)  is freaking hilarious.

I imagine people who join through these ads leave after 2 minutes when they realize the game and the ads have no connection.

The really absurd thing about Evony and these ads is this: There ARE no playable characters in this game... All it was was building walls and houses and barracks. Even when you build "armies", you never see the army... just "100 soldiers ready". And when you sent the army out all you got was "200 soldiers sent" followed by "200 soldiers returned". I used to play it long ago and quit it when I got tired of it.

I love Empire Building games, but I never even checked Evony because I thought it was one of those virus ads.
I might have tried it out if it wasn't trying so hard to get me to play it, I didn't even know it was an Empire Building game until now.

Really, Evony? Using porn to advertise an un-porny game.. Why are they all women anyway?

You missed the very first Evony adds.  The one I clicked on when they only had one server was a plain black background with bold, white text in the middle that said: "Play Me".

I played it for a few months after that and really got a kick as I watched their adds look more and more like a desperate dating site.

That is appalling. Especially when you actually play Evony and realize how far away it is from anything to do with a naked woman. I think it's insulting to men, really. It suggests that they would click on any ad with a naked woman on it, but aren't smart enough to decide whether they want to play to play a game based on what it actually is. Warriors? no, thanks. Oh, warriors and BOOBS? will do!

I found another one at www.flashgames2000.com

www.flashgames2000.com/wp-includes/images/evonyad.png

lol I see the one that got me addicted to this game....the 5th an 6th one down...Never played a comp. game before, thought I was getting on a free dating site. Once I was in an messed around a bit got hooked, 4yrs later like 8 servers under my belt still hooked....Damn you misleading advertising, you made me lose years of my life and hundreds of dollars........

it just pisses me off how the game is probably complete crap yet a bunch of teenagers in a garage will try everything just to get players, that will be disappointed to find the game has nothing to do with the ads, making them the record holder for the world's stupidest ads. It's ridiculous how people resort to this kind of thing. Seriously, the ads had nothing to do with the game, a few of the ads were pictures of random women, like that picture of boobs, and that game thing. It's ridiculous, and they should be classified as one of those adware programs that you get when you download something off the internet and it replaces the Google ads that are actually dam steroids and fake weight loss ads that are filled with viruses. RIDICULOUS

Bleh, whatever, it's marketing. Who is really surprised by this?

I would be surprised if a game developer with a reputation did this - take a popular Nintendo title for example, but this is cheap online game.

My brother and I have been sending each other ads like this every time we found a new one. This is a better complilation than we had.
May i suggest also looking at "Wartune" ?

Wasn't Evony the Civilization clone that went so far as to make exact copies of the game text from Civ on top of basically being the exact same game with a different title?

I miss these ads lmfao I mean now they have other games but this is the start.

I have spent years purposely not clicking ads for this game on suspicion of it being a stroke-fest. I wondered why it was being advertised all over the place.

Now that I know that it's not just a T&A game I'm actually more interested in playing it! So how does that grab you, game companies?

this one isn't bad also :p
http://i31.tinypic.com/162m3n.png

These free online game ads are all shoddy, boobage or not. I've seen hundreds of these, each with less context than the last. If anything, they just make me shy away from the game (though I haven't had this problem since I installed an adblocker on my browser, thankfully). This only goes to show that some PR people still hasn't evolved beyond the mentality that every gamer is an underage, pimple-faced kid who likes to spend time jerking off to porn when they're alone.
Either way, I wouldn't jump into a game I never heard of before, even if it's by word of mouth. Especially with this kind of crappy campaign - I see all those "free online ninja game" banners with Naruto images plastered all over and think, does Shueisha or Masashi Kishimoto know they're doing this to their property? And don't get me started when they threw One Piece into the mix. This isn't inviting to me, it's confusing at the very least.

Too many boring words down here going to have to scroll back up for the boobies...

The fact that the lady in the third ad appears to be more alarmed at the *viewer* than at the sword pointed at her heart really sums up these ads.

What I don't understand is why the spyware companies haven't caught on yet and just focused on games that continue the process and cater to the same people who get drawn in by the ads.

i know that there are games out there like that, but I never figured out why Evony didn't continue the evolution process and become Boobcraft or Nakedladyville or something.

I like seeing how many people get actively offended from this, because that means they still have some hope that humanity can be better than that. I simply shrug my shoulders and move on.

Has the Evony headquarters got the Raging Man War yet? I'd love to know.

That blonde woman in the "Come play, my lord." and the "Start your journey now, my lord." isn't even attractive. She has a very average face. And that queen on the third ad is just plain creepy!

This is probably the worst ad campaign of all time. Couldn't they at least keep the medieval theme? That sign-up screen looks like that of a porn site!

Hi, I'm from the future!

It's still a shitty game which leaks information, check it out!

https://techraptor.net/content/evony-gaming-data-breach-affect-33-million-players

this is why ACTUAL quality games do not advertise boobs even though they have boobs. Imagine how few people would actually play DDLC if it was advertised like these ridiculous ads.

What's so funny about this to me is that I used to play Evony when I was like 9, because my ex. step dad used to play it. I wasn't playing for the boobs, I was playing for the tycoon aspect and never even realized boobs were what attracted other players loool

a1009716077@gmail.com

Awesome post.