Microsoft Patent Discusses Personalised Advertisements In Games

RUNDOWN:

• Microsoft Corporation may possibly be working on a technology to display personalised content to players using cloud gaming services concurrently with the gameplay based on their interests.
• The technology intends to display overlaid video content personalised for a player in real-time concurrently with the gameplay without changing the features within the particular video game.
• The technology allows seamless integration of the content into a particular video game so as to not cause any intrusion for the player and provide a natural video game experience.
• The personalised content may not only be restricted to the video game environment(s) but may also be featured on in-game characters and objects.

Microsoft Corporation is one of the world’s most widely recognised technology companies, currently competing with the likes of Sony Corporation. With so much that the company has achieved thus far and plans to achieve, it comes as no surprise that Microsoft Corporation is constantly improving its technologies to provide a better and more accessible video game experience to players around the world, particularly with its focus on Xbox Cloud Gaming, the cloud gaming service from Xbox Game Studios.

While the company files and publishes many patents every day, one recently published patent from the company that stands out discusses displaying personalised content to players using cloud gaming services concurrently with the gameplay based on their interests, which seems to be in-game advertisements.

Earlier today, we came across a recently published patent from Microsoft Corporation under the name MICROSOFT TECHNOLOGY LICENSING, LLC titled “PROVIDING PERSONALIZED CONTENT FOR UNINTRUSIVE ONLINE GAMING EXPERIENCE,” which was filed in May and was published at the start of this month. “A method for providing content to a user during gameplay includes determining that the user is interacting with a game provided by an online streaming provider and identifying a time frame within the game during which the user’s interaction with the game are predicted to be below a threshold interaction count,” reads the abstract for the patent.

It further reads, “The method includes identifying a location within the game environment for overlaying content during the time frame and identifying content for displaying to the user. The content is to be displayed via an overlay video stream distinct from a gameplay stream. In real time of the user’s gameplay, the overlay video stream is sent to be displayed to the user concurrently with the gameplay stream to provide the content for the user at the identified location during at least a portion of the time frame.”

Hence, it seems like Microsoft Corporation is working on a technology to display overlaid video content personalised for a particular player in real-time concurrently with the gameplay without actually changing the features within the particular video game. Additionally, there may also be a threshold for the interaction that the player has with the video game, which would determine what content would be displayed to the player within a particular video game.

“Computer games are becoming increasingly popular with the availability of cloud-based gaming platforms. Users enjoy the ability to select and play games from the comfort of their own computers without committing to costly gaming consoles. To add interest and immersive enjoyability of the available games, personalization options are contemplated. Users are more inclined to play games that include features that are specific to their interests,” reads the patent.

“Providing individually tailored custom gameplay experience may be difficult to create without adding various features to the original game. Further, generating and developing unique content for each player would require tremendous efforts by the development team that will prove costly and cumbersome.”

From this, it seems like the technology is intended primarily for cloud gaming, as personalisation is a cumbersome challenge for the development team where the gameplay is being streamed from hardware besides the one being used by the player.

As mentioned, it seems like this technology aspires to incorporate personalised advertisements in video games based on the interests of the players, as one of the drawings mentioned within the patent uses an example of a football simulation video game to explain how the advertisements on the advertising boards within an in-game stadium may change according to the personalised content determined from the interactions of the player within the particular video game.

“As described herein, methods and systems are described to provide an overlay stream to be streamed to a receiving device (e.g., client device 702 in FIG. 7, user device 102, FIG. 1) along with the original gaming stream. Example scene 204 includes player 212 and shows the banner 210 having an overlay of the original banner 206 that replaces the “Tantander” banner with Xbox logos. The Xbox logos are provided within the context of FIG. 2 as an example advertisement to be provided to a user,” reads the patent.

Furthermore, the personalised content won’t be integrated directly into a particular video game, as described by the patent, but rather, the technology allows seamless integration of the content into a particular video game so as to not cause any intrusion for the player and provide a natural video game experience.

Hence, the technology may not be restricted to a few video games only, as it does not require the development team to incorporate the feature into the video games. Additionally, the content to be displayed and where it may be displayed within a particular video game environment may be determined based on the in-game environment of the player within a particular video game, so it does not obstruct the gameplay experience.

In addition to this, the personalised content may not be restricted to the video game environment(s) only, as some video games, like sports simulation video games, feature advertisements on in-game characters and objects as well. For instance, personalised content in a sports simulation video game may also be displayed on the attire of the in-game characters.

“An overlay stream is configured to provide the Xbox logo for display on a torso portion of the figurine. In some embodiments, the overlay stream is configured to provide the content (e.g., ad) on various other locations within the figurine. For example, figurine 408 may include several content items at various locations that have been identified as ad space, such as on the chest, arms, shorts, and socks,” explains the patent.

Lastly, the patent mentions a database that may be maintained of players, which may include recordings of past gameplay experiences and interactions, the frequencies of such interactions within a particular video game, the in-game environment(s) that they’re continuously associated with, and the duration of the interactions within a particular video game.

Eventually, the database will be used by the machine learning model to determine the personalised content, such as advertisements, to be displayed to a particular player as an overlay and its placement within a particular video game based on the analysed factors.

In April, it was disclosed that Microsoft Corporation allegedly planned to allow companies to purchase advertisement space in free-to-play video games on Xbox platforms, according to a report from Business Insider. Furthermore, it was stated that the company would not be taking any percentage of the revenue generated through in-game advertisements to encourage companies to generate revenue from free-to-play video games outside of microtransactions.

While in-game advertisements have been a cause for controversy among players, many video games, like Fortnite, have incorporated them in some form. It seems like Microsoft Corporation is only taking this a degree further by personalising them according to the interests of the players and making in-game advertisements immersive to the in-game environment(s).

What do you think about this? Do tell us your opinions in the comments below!

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