JP2009509680A - Use of information from user video game conversational processing to target advertisements, such as advertisements provided within video games - Google Patents

Abstract

  Information about a person's interests and game behavior may be determined by monitoring (and possibly inferring from such activities) their online game activity. Such information may be used to improve advertising targeting. For example, such information may be used to target advertisements to be rendered within a video game being played by a person.

Description

  The present invention relates to targeting the provision of advertisements, such as advertisements rendered in a virtual environment such as a video game. In particular, the present invention relates to determining user information for use in advertising targeting and determining related advertisements and supplying them to a virtual environment such as a video game.

  In-game advertising is extremely popular. This trend is expected to continue as males aged 18-34 in the United States are less watching TV and spending more time playing video games than ever before. The video game industry is becoming a media force comparable to the television and movie industries. Thus, advertising agencies and game producers are collaborating to introduce more ads into video games. Currently, in-game advertising is used to advertise real products and services in a manner similar to product placement in movies and television programs. For example, a decal on a virtual race car can advertise a product or service. As another example, a banner on a stadium or on a racetrack may advertise a product or service.

  Unfortunately, advertisements placed in various video games are usually determined while the game is being developed and are therefore relatively unchanged. In addition, advertisements typically target a wide group of age groups. Thus, often in-game advertisements are not as relevant and useful as they are.

  Another trend is that game producers spend more money on video game development than before. In previous generations of video game consoles (Sony (R) Playstation (R), Sega (R) Saturn (R), Nintendo (R) 64, etc.), game developers can use a single video game Development costs of $ 1 million were hardly reached. Currently, low-end games often cost $ 23 million for development, and high-end games often cost more. While game prices hit the ceiling, game development costs are increasing. Despite in-game advertising helping game publishers offset such development costs, revenue from such advertising did not increase rapidly enough to keep pace with development costs. .

  In view of the above, it is useful to improve in-game advertising. One possible improvement is to provide more useful and relevant advertisements. Another possible improvement is to increase advertising revenue.

  Embodiments consistent with the present invention allow information about human interests and game behavior to be determined by monitoring their online gaming activity (and possibly inferring from such activity). Become. Such information may be used to improve advertising targeting. For example, such information may be used to target advertisements that are to be rendered within a video game being played by a person.

  Section 4: Detailed explanation

  The present invention is a novel for improving advertisements, such as, for example, providing advertisements within a video game using information about the video game player, as determined from conversational processing of the video game player with the video game. Method, apparatus, message format, and / or data structure. The following description is published and configured within the environment of specific applications and their requirements to enable those of ordinary skill in the art to make and use the invention. Thus, the following description of embodiments consistent with the present invention provides figures and descriptions, but is not exhaustive and is not intended to limit the invention to the precise form disclosed. Various modifications to the disclosed embodiments will be apparent to those skilled in the art, and the general principles described below may be applied to other embodiments and applications. For example, a sequence of operations is described with reference to a flowchart, but in other implementations, the order of operations may be different when execution of one operation does not depend on completion of another operation. Further, operations without dependency may be executed in parallel. Any component, operation, or instruction used in this specification should not be construed as critical or essential to the invention unless explicitly described as such. As used herein, the part of speech “a” is intended to include one or more members. When only one member is intended, the term “one” or similar terminology is used. In the following, “information” may refer to actual information or a pointer, identifier, or location to such information. Thus, the present invention is not intended to be limited to the embodiments shown, and the inventor regards his invention to include any patentable subject matter described.

In the following, definitions of terms that may be used in the specification are provided in section 4.1. Then, the environment in which the present invention can operate or the environment in which the present invention can operate is described in section 4.2. An exemplary embodiment of the present invention is described in Section 4.3. Subsequently, a specific example illustrating the usefulness of one exemplary embodiment of the present invention is provided in Section 4.4.
Finally, some conclusions regarding the present invention are described in Section 4.5.

  Section 4.1: Definition

  Online advertising may have various unique features. Such features may be specified by the application and / or advertiser. These features are referred to below as “advertising functions”. For example, in the case of a text advertisement, the advertisement function may include a title line, advertisement text, and an embedded link. In the case of an image advertisement, the advertisement function may comprise an image, executable code and embedded link association. Depending on the type of online advertisement, the advertisement function may comprise one or more of the following: text, association, audio file, video file, image file, executable code, embedded information, and the like. The advertisement image may be scaled, rotated, or distorted as necessary to fit within the advertisement spot.

 When an online advertisement is provided, one or more parameters may be used to describe how, when and / or where the advertisement was provided. These parameters are referred to below as “provided parameters”. Delivery parameters may include, for example, the following (including information) characteristics of a video game or video game console (or more generally, a “video game device”) on which or in conjunction with an advertisement: Or the characteristics of the document on which the advertisement was provided or accompanied, the information in the advertisement request associated with the advertisement offer, the user characteristics (e.g. their geographical location, the language used by the user, Type of browser used, previous page view, previous behavior, user account, web cookies, user device features, etc.), the host or affiliate site that originated the request (eg, American Online®, Google® Trademark), Yahoo (registered trademark), when it was provided Clean or absolute position of the ad on the page, the position of the ad (spatial or temporal) relative to other served ads, the absolute size of the ad, the size of the ad relative to other ads, It may also comprise one or more of a color, the number of other served advertisements, the type of other served advertisements, the time served, the time of week provided, the time of year provided, etc. good. Of course, there are other provided parameters that may be used in the context of the present invention.

  Offer parameters may be non-essential in advertising functions, but they may be associated with ads as serving conditions or constraints. When used as a provisioning condition or constraint, such provisioning parameters are simply referred to as “provisioning constraints” (or “targeting criteria”). For example, in some systems, an advertiser provides an advertisement by specifying that the advertisement is served only on weekdays, not lower than a certain position, only to users in certain locations, etc. It may be possible to target As another example, in some systems, an advertiser may specify that the advertisement should be provided within a particular video game or on a particular video game device. As yet another example, in some systems, an advertiser may specify that an advertisement should only be provided to a particular type of user or a user with a particular attribute. good. As another example, in some systems, an advertiser may specify that an advertisement should only be served when the page or search query includes a particular keyword or phrase. As yet another example, in some systems, an advertiser may have the document on which the advertisement is to be served on or in conjunction with a specific topic or concept, or a specific cluster. ) Or clusters, or some other classification or classification (eg, verticals) may be identified as being served. In some systems, an advertiser may specify that the advertisement should (or should not) be provided only to user devices that have specific characteristics. Finally, in some systems, an advertisement may be targeted so that it is served in response to a request originating from a particular location or in response to a request for a particular location.

  “Advertising Information” means advertising functions, advertising provision restrictions, advertising functions or information derived from advertising provisions (referred to as “advertising information”) and / or information associated with Korea (referred to as “advertising related information”), Also, any combination of such information extensions (for example, information derived from advertisement-related information) may be provided.

  The ratio of the number of ad selections (eg, click-through) to the number of ad impressions (ie, the number of times an ad has been rendered) is defined as the “selection rate” (or “click-through rate” or “CTR”) of the ad Is done.

  A “conversion” is said to occur when a user completes a process associated with a previously served advertisement. What constitutes a conversion can vary from case to case and can be defined in various ways. For example, when a user clicks on an advertisement and is routed to the advertiser's web page and completes the purchase before leaving the web page, a conversion may occur, instead Conversion may be defined as an advertisement is displayed to the user and purchase is made on the advertiser's web page within a predetermined time (for example, 7 days). In yet another variation, for example, downloading a white paper, navigating to at least a given depth of a website, browsing a web page at least a certain number of times, at least a predetermined amount of time on a website or web page Conversion may be defined by the advertiser as any measurable / observable user action, such as consuming a user, registering on a website, etc. Often, if the user action does not indicate a completed purchase, the user actions that make up the conversion are not limited to this, but may indicate a sales lead. In fact, many other definitions of what constitutes a conversion are possible.

  The ratio of conversions to impressions of an ad (ie, the number of times an ad has been rendered) and the ratio of conversions to the number of selections (or some other early event) are both "conversion rate" or " Called “CR”. The type of conversion rate is obvious from the context in which it is used. If conversions are defined as those that can occur within a given amount of time from the delivery of an advertisement, one possible definition of conversion rate need only consider advertisements that have been served in the past more than a given time. .

A “property” can display an advertisement. Properties include online content (websites, MP3 audio programs, online (eg video) games, etc.) and offline content (eg video games played in non-online video game devices, newspapers, magazines, plays, concerts , Sports events, etc.) and / or offline objects (eg, bulletin boards, stadium scoreboards and outfield walls, cargo trailer sides, etc.) are referred to as “media properties”. Even though the property itself is offline, relevant information about the property (eg, attributes, topics, concepts, categories, keywords, relevance information, supported ad types, etc.) may be available online. . For example, outdoor jazz music festivals include topics “music” and “jazz”, concert locations, concert times, artists scheduled to appear in the festival, types of advertising spots available (ie, within the printed program) A spot, a spot on the stage, a spot on the back of the seat, a voice announcement of a sponsor, etc.).

  A “document” should generally be interpreted broadly to include work products that can be read and stored on any machine. A document may be a file, a combination of files, other files, one or more files with embedded links to a display screen or video sequence (eg, in a video game). The file may be of any type such as text, audio, image, video, etc. The part of the document to be provided to the end user may be interpreted as the “content” of the document. A document is “structured data” that has both content (words, photos, etc.) and some indication of the meaning of the content (eg, email fields and related data, HTML tags and related data, etc.). May be included. Advertising spots in the document may be defined by embedded information or instructions. In the Internet environment, a normal document is a web page. Web pages often have content and can include embedded information (such as meta information, hyperlinks, etc.) and / or embedded instructions (such as JavaScript). In many cases, a document has an addressable storage location and can therefore be uniquely identified by this addressable location. A universal resource locator (URL) is an address used to access information on the Internet.

A “web document” comprises any document published on the web.
Examples of web documents include, for example, websites or web pages.

  “Document information” is any information contained in the document, any information derived from information contained in the document (referred to as “document-derived information”), and / or any information related to the document. Any information (referred to as “document related information”) and an extension of such information (eg, information derived from related information) may be provided. An example of information derived from a document is a classification based on the original content of the document. Examples of document related information include document information from other documents that have links to instant documents, and document information from other documents that the instant documents link to.

  Content from a document may be drawn on an “application or device that draws content”. Examples of applications that render content include Internet browsers (eg, Explorer (registered trademark), Netscape (registered trademark), Opera (registered trademark), Firefox (registered trademark), etc.), media players (eg, MP3 players, Realnetworks ( (Registered trademark) streaming audio file player, etc.), viewer (for example, Abrobe (registered trademark) Acrobat (registered trademark) pdf Reader), video game device (PlayStation2 (registered trademark) from Sony (registered trademark), Microsoft (registered trademark)) XBox (registered trademark), video game consoles such as GameCube from Nintendo (registered trademark), personal computers, mobile phones, personal computers It includes the information equipment, etc.).

  A “content owner” is a person or organization with some ownership of content (eg, a document) on owned media. The content owner may be the content creator. In addition or alternatively, the content owner may have the right to play the content, prepare the secondary work of the content, display or execute the content to the public, and / or other content May be included. The content server may be the content owner in the content of the documents it provides, but this is not necessary. A “web publisher” is an example of a content owner.

  The “user information” may include user behavior information and / or user profile information.

  Section 4.2: Typical advertising environment in which the present invention operates

  FIG. 1 is a bubble diagram of exemplary operations that may be performed in a manner consistent with the present invention and information that may be used and / or generated by such operations. The environment 100 illustrated in FIG. 1 may also be used to determine related advertisements and / or select related advertisement creatives to be displayed within or by a video game. good. Alternatively or in addition, the environment 100 illustrated in FIG. 1 may be used to track user video game conversational processing information, such user information being However, it may be used to assist in selecting relevant advertisements that are displayed outside of the video game. The environment 100 may include a game play tracking operation 114, an advertisement spot filling operation 138, and an advertisement providing operation 170.

  The game play tracking operation 114 may collect user input information 118 and provide it to the advertisement spot filling operation 138. Further, game state based information 130 may be provided to the advertisement spot filling operation 138. Further, the user information estimation operation 122 may be used to generate additional user information 126. Such an estimate may be generated using user input information 118 and / or game state based information 130. Finally, the video game device 110 may store other game information 134 such as a console name or brand, a console identifier, a console location, a game identifier (currently loaded), and the like. Using game state-based information 130, user input information 118, user information 126, and / or other game information 134, ad spot filling operation 138 may (i) generate a request for a related advertisement, and (ii) When an advertisement is to be displayed in a game, the request is forwarded (via one or more networks 140) to an advertisement providing operation 172, and (iii) in one or more advertisement spots within the video game An advertisement may be drawn.

  Advertisers 150 may interact with advertisement server 160 via advertisement information input and management operations 164 and network 140 to submit their advertisements and advertisement information. This information is stored in the advertisement information 168 and may include advertisement products, provision restrictions, application information, and the like. Advertisement information input and management operation 164 may notify advertiser 150 of various game attributes that may target their advertisement.

  The advertisement providing operation 172 may accept an advertisement request from the advertisement spot filling operation 138. Such requests may include game state based information 130, user input information 118, user information (local) 126, and / or other game information 134, and appropriate ad selection and rendering (eg, display, text dialog). Or other relevant information (eg, ad size, ad type, when an ad is needed, etc.) required for an audio segment, etc. Using the request information from the game system, the advertisement providing operation 172 may select relevant advertisements and / or advertisement products from the advertisement information 168. If there are multiple related ads competing at a given ad spot (or too many related ads competing at a limited number of ad spots), the ad serving operation 172 may select the best ad (ad ) Or mediation may be performed to select advertisements (ads). The advertisement providing operation 172 may then provide the selected advertisements to the advertisement spot filling operation 138 so that these advertisements can be drawn within the appropriate advertisement spots within the video game.

  The advertisement server may include an accounting and / or billing operation 176 in addition to the advertisement providing operation 172 and the advertisement information input and management operation 164.

  The user information server 180 may be configured to accept, possibly generate and store user information (remote) 188. The user game registration operation 192 may receive and store user information in an in-game or game console product registration, or by online game application registration. User information estimation and storage operation 196 may estimate specific attributes or features of the user from user input information 118. User information providing operation 184 may be used to provide user information 188 to the requesting entity. For example, the advertisement server 160 may include a user identifier but may not include information (or incomplete information) about the user. It may forward a request comprising a user identifier to the user information server 180. The user information server 180 may use the user identifier to retrieve relevant user information (remote) 188 and return it to the advertisement server 160.

The game play tracking operation 114 may track input (eg, play, selection, etc.) information 118 of a game player (also referred to as a “user”).
For example, in most simulation games, such as the Formula One racing game, the user can use existing global brands / teams of cars (e.g., Ferrari (R), Williams-BMW (R), McLaren-Mergedes (R)). ), Renault®, etc.) and specific drivers (eg, Michael Schumacher, Fernando Alonso, Rubens Barrichello, etc.) The race track to be used, the color of the car, the tire type, etc. may be selected. In other games, as in a first person shooter, users can select their character roles, for example, doctor, mercenary, engineer, soldier, thief, wizard, alien, etc. In sports games, the user can select a team, stadium or even player from an existing team player list. In addition, in many games, users will be able to see their character's gender, their character's personality, the clothes for their players, the physical attributes of their players (fat, lean, muscular High, low, hair color and style, ethnicity, eye color, etc.), soundtrack and other sound / visual features, and many other customizable features may be selected. Such selection inputs may be investigated by the game play tracking operation 114 and may be stored as user input information 118, which can then be used for the advertisement spot filling operation 138.

Such user input information 118 may be used to assist in selecting relevant advertisements. As an example, if the user selects a racing car from Dodge®, the system may display an ad for the Dodge® or something related. As another example, if the user selects a sports team from Miami, the system may show advertisements for tickets for Miami events. As another example, if the user selects the soundtrack of the video game “Beastie Boys”, the system may suggest advertisements for rap / hip hop and other (not Britney Spears) related music. As yet another example, if the user chooses to drive a black car in a racing game, the system may display an advertisement with a black car (instead of another color car). As a further example, if the user selects a male character, the system may display an advertisement that is tailored to the male.
If the user has been playing continuously for more than two hours, the system may display advertisements for Pizza-hut®, cola, coffee and other related merchandise.

  The game state-based information 120 may include information regarding the user's game play. For example, it is how fast the player is raising the level, how much the player is accustomed to the game, and what level the player is at (ie, in many games, the players play cooperatively) As the player gains more experience, the skill level is achieved, for example, as in the 99th level wizard in a role-playing game), how long the player is playing the game, and how often the user is playing You may have the habit of playing various games or pausing play, the game information stored in a non-volatile memory, etc. The game state-based information 130 may include session information (activation time, play period, etc.). This game state based information 130 is then available in an advertisement spot filling operation 138. For example, if the user has been playing continuously for more than two hours, the system may display advertisements for Pizza-hut®, cola, coffee and other related merchandise.

User information estimation operations (local and / or remote) 122 and / or 184 may use user input information 118 to estimate attributes of users 126 and / or 188. Such estimated user information 126 and / or 188 may then be used in selecting eligible advertisements according to the advertising targeting attributes. In particular, in an online RPG game, the user's play characteristics (for example, time spent for chatting with other virtual players vs. time spent for bartering, time spent stealing and exploiting time) Anti-construction, completion of time vs. level spent trying out new items, decisions made by players led to specific situations (good vs. evil, strategic vs. short term), collision avoidance (risk dislike) vs. attack , Cooperative and collaborative versus single action, friendly and hostile, etc.) can be particularly useful. User input information may be useful to assist in estimating information about the user. Examples of other user information that may be estimated include familiarity with the game, time spent playing the game, how far the user has advanced, and / or skill level.
The estimation derived from such user input information may be performed using a well-known classification method such as a neural network, a Bayesian network, or a support vector machine. User information estimated in this way may be useful to assist in targeting the advertisement. For example, in a game, users who spend a lot of time exchanging barters instead of stealing may indicate that they are more interested in the best deals than flashy items, so the system , An advertisement reflecting the value may be displayed. As another example, a user who spends a lot of time exploring suggests that they are probably interested in vacation, so the system may display an advertisement for vacation. As another example, instead of performing battles or other actions in online games, users who spend a lot of time in chat suggest that they prefer chat, so the system will advertise mobile phones , Long distance plans, chat messenger advertisements, etc. may be displayed.

  In summary, the advertisement spot filling operation 138 serves to request an advertisement by the advertisement server and then provide the advertisement for rendering on the advertisement spot. In particular, the advertisement spot filling operation 138 may submit a request to the advertisement providing operation 172 whenever an advertisement is to be displayed in the game. The request is for user information (eg, recall 118 and 126), game information (eg, recall 130 and 134), characteristics of the advertisement to be delivered (eg, type, size, etc.), game console 110 May be provided. There are numerous other opportunities for advertisements to be displayed or otherwise rendered in a video game. For example, in a first person shooting game, the advertisement may be displayed on a vending machine, a bulletin board, a poster on the wall, a television screen through which a character passes. In racing games, advertisements may be placed on the car, on signs or bulletin boards along the streets and race tracks, or may be announced on the virtual radio of the car that the player drives. . In many sports games, advertisements may be displayed on the scoreboard and along the court / field sidelines. Advertisements may be inserted as text or utterance dialogs, as audio clips in virtual radio, and the like. In online action adventure and role-playing games (RPG), it is common to simulate a real-world environment where gamers roam a vast environment, thereby providing numerous places where advertisements can be displayed. For example, gamers walk around and talk in metropolitan markets (eg, stop for food, stop at McDonalds®, cut hair, go to night clubs for drinking, buy cars, buy real estate, taxis / You can use bus / subway to move around the city, buy goods from various stores, play video games in the arcade, etc., as if it were in a real city market As such, it provides many possible spots where advertisements can be displayed.

  As such, the advertisement providing operation 172 may be used to select an appropriate related advertisement and may use attributes and related information collected during game play. When there are multiple eligible ads competing for too few ad spots, such an ad serving action 172 may select a winning ad among many competing ads. Application information (eg, bids) submitted by advertiser 160 may be used. Once the winning advertisement is selected, the advertisement providing operation 172 may return the advertisement to the advertisement spot filling operation 138 for rendering in the video game.

  4.3.1: Typical methods

  FIG. 2 is a flowchart of an exemplary method 200 for performing method selection and play tracking operations consistent with the present invention. Specifically, the method 200 may be used to monitor and store information about how a user is playing and interacting with a video game. (Recall FIG. 1, 130.) Depending on the various events that can occur, the method 200 may perform various operations. Method 200 can begin session tracking when a gaming system (eg, Sony® PlayStation®, Nintendo GameCube®, MicroSoft Xbox®, PC, etc.) is powered on. (Block 210). (Block 220) Conversely, when the gaming system is powered off or shut down, the method 200 terminates session tracking (Block 230) and also stores and / or transmits session information (Block 240). good. User input occurs during the power-on state. In response, the method 200 may track such user input. (Block 250) The method may use user input to estimate user information. (Block 260) The method 200 may then store and / or transmit information regarding user input and / or estimated user information for future use. (Block 270)

Blocks 220, 230 and 250 are referenced again. Each time the game system is in operation, the method 200 may monitor user selection and game play.
Specifically, each time the game system is powered on, the method 200 may begin session tracking (start monitoring and collecting user information). When the player turns off the game system, the method 200 may terminate session tracking and store / send session information collected during operation of the game system. The session information may include, for example, a game identifier, a start time, a pause time, and the like.

  Blocks 250, 260 and 270 are referenced again. Method 200 may simply track user input, but may also use user input to estimate user information / features. User input may comprise user selection, user dialog, user play, and the like. User selections include, for example, one or more characters, vehicles (eg, specific brand cars, car colors, engine modifications, car modifications, etc.), tracks, courses or fields (eg, specific trucks, specific stadiums, etc.) Teams, players, clothing, physical attributes, etc. may be provided. Depending on the game genre, there are many customizations that the user can select. These choices may reflect the user's fondness, preference and / or interest. User dialogs (eg, from role-playing games, simulation games, etc.) can also be used to characterize the user (eg, well-educated, ignorant, unrespected, unreserved, or polite, quiet or talking) good. User play also characterizes the user (eg cautious, strategic, risk-free, positive, non-conflicting, eye-catching, honest, dishonest, cooperative, non-cooperative etc.) May be used.

  As described in further detail below, user input and / or estimated user information may be used to select relevant advertisements by the user.

   FIG. 3 is a flowchart of an exemplary method 300 for performing an advertisement spot filling operation in a manner consistent with the present invention. The advertisement spot filling operation serves to request in-game advertisements, receive the requested advertisements, and draw them at appropriate spots within the video game. Different branches of the method 300 are performed in response to different events. (Block 310) Specifically, if an advertisement (ad) or advertisement (ads) is desired (for rendering in a game), the method 300 may include advertisement spot information (Block 320) and (A). At least one of game state-based information, (B) user input information, (C) user information, and (D) other game information may be acquired. (Block 330) Finally, the method 300 may generate a request for one or more advertisements. The request may comprise at least one of advertising spot information, (A) game state based information, (B) user input information, (C) user information, and (D) other game information. (Block 340) The block 310 is referred to again. The method 300 may also receive one or more requested advertisements (eg, from an advertisement server). In that case, the method 300 may proceed to placement of the advertisement within the appropriate advertisement spot for drawing.

  Refer again to the right branch of FIG. Advertisements may be desired at various times. For example, advertisements may be desired in one or more of (a) power on, (b) game load, (c) during play, (d) if necessary, (e) prior to need prediction. May be.

  Block 320 is referenced again. The advertisement spot information may include an advertisement spot identifier, an advertisement size, an advertisement type, an advertisement period, and the like. Block 330 is referenced again. The game state based information may comprise information as described above with reference to 130 of FIG. 1, and the user input information is described above with reference to 118 of FIG. The user information may comprise information as described above with reference to 126 of FIG. 1, and the other game information may be of FIG. Information as described above with reference to 134 may be provided.

  Block 340 is referenced again. Once the method 300 has obtained the relevant information, the method 300 may proceed to requesting an advertisement from the advertisement server. The ad server uses the information provided in the request to determine eligible relevant advertisements. If there are too many eligible, relevant ads for a given ad spot, the ad server may arbitrate within the competing ad (eg, using an auction). The determined advertisement is then returned to the method 300 where it is rendered at the appropriate advertisement spot.

  FIG. 4 is a flowchart of an exemplary method 400 for performing the advertisement providing operation of the method consistent with the present invention. The method 400 is responsible for providing the requested advertisement to the gaming system. Specifically, the method 400 may accept an advertisement request from a game system. (Block 420) Upon receiving such a request, the method 400 may include (A) user information, (B) game state based information, (C) user input information, (D) other information, and (E) possibly One or more advertisements may be determined using at least one of advertisement provision constraints and associated advertisement spot information. Once the advertisement (ad) or advertisement (ads) is determined, the method 400 may send the advertisement back to the game system. (Block 460)

  Block 440 is referenced again. The user information may comprise user information stored in the game system. Alternatively or additionally, user information from other sources may be used. (For example, recall 188 in FIG. 1.) That is, the advertising server may have sent a request for user information, which includes a user identifier or a game system ID.

  Further, the method 400 performs an arbitration operation to determine the winning advertisement among many competing advertisements when there are too many advertisements competing for too few ad spots. You may do it. Therefore, an advertiser may submit application information (for example, a bid) in addition to those advertisements. As a result, when selecting an advertisement, the method 400 considers user information, game state based information, user input information, advertisement spot information and / or other information to determine relevant advertisements, and then , Perhaps the application information may be used in addition to other elements to score or rank relevant advertisements.

  Section 4.3.2: Typical equipment

   FIG. 5 is a high-level block diagram of a machine 500 that can perform one or more of the operations described above. The machine 500 serves as a basis for communicating information between one or more processors 510, one or more input / output interface units 530, one or more storage devices 520, and coupled components. One or more system buses and / or networks 540 may be included to facilitate. One or more input devices 532 and one or more output devices 534 may be connected to one or more input / output interfaces 530.

  The one or more processors 510 are machine-executable instructions (eg, a Solaris® operating system available from Sun Microsystems Inc., Palo Alto, Calif.) To implement one or more configurations of the present invention. Or C or C ++ running on a Linux (R) operating system widely available from many vendors such as RedHat (R) Inc. of Durham, NC. At least a portion of the machine-executable instructions may be stored (temporarily or more permanently) in one or more storage devices 520 and / or via one or more input interface units 530. It may be received from an external source.

  In one embodiment, the machine 500 includes one or more conventional personal computers and / or one or more video game devices (ie, for example, a video game console, personal computer, mobile phone, personal portable information device). Any device capable of playing video games can be used. In this case, the arithmetic processing unit 510 may be one or a plurality of microprocessors. The bus 540 may include a system bus. The storage device 520 may comprise system memory, such as, for example, read only memory (ROM) and / or random access memory (RAM). The storage device 520 includes a hard disk drive for reading from and writing to a hard disk, a magnetic disk drive for reading or writing from (eg, removable) magnetic disks, and, for example, a compact disk or other light ( An optical disk drive for reading or writing from a removable optical (magnetic) disk, such as a magnetic) medium, may be provided.

  A user may enter commands and information into the personal computer through input device 532, such as a keyboard and pointing device (eg, a mouse), for example. Other input devices such as a microphone, joystick, game pad, satellite antenna, scanner, etc. may also be provided (or alternatively). These and other input devices are often connected to the processing unit 510 via an appropriate interface 530 connected to the system bus 540. The output device 534 may comprise a monitor or other type of display device, which may be connected to the system bus 540 via a suitable interface. In addition to (or instead of) the monitor, the personal computer may include other (peripheral) output devices (not shown), such as speakers and printers, for example.

  Section 4.3.3: Modifications and Extensions

  The method for targeting the in-game advertisement of the online game is not limited to the above method. There can be many different ways and variations on the above to target in-game advertisements for online games. For example, advertisements may simply be targeted based on the type of game and expected real demographics. The correct advertisement may be selected using an arbitration process such as an auction.

  Some of the above embodiments include (A) tracking user input or conversational processing with a video game (and possibly inferring user information from such user input), and (B) dynamic However, embodiments consistent with the present invention do not have to perform all of these functions, although the steps of determining advertisements and possibly (C) using user information are simplified. Indeed, various embodiments consistent with the present invention may only employ one or perhaps two of these functions. For example, at least some embodiments consistent with the present invention may track a user's video game input (and possibly infer usage information from such user input) and use such user information as It may be used for other purposes, such as targeting advertisements that are not rendered in the video game. As another example, user information collected or estimated from video game input or conversational processing need not be considered when determining advertisements associated with advertising spots in a video game. That is, in some embodiments consistent with the present invention, video game advertisements (or instances thereof) may simply be determined dynamically without the relevant information provided from a particular video game console device. In yet another embodiment, user information from some other source may be used to target an advertisement to an advertising spot in a video game being played on a gaming system associated with the user. . Other combinations of these features are possible.

  According to the foregoing, the system may collect information related to user behavior during game play. In particular, an example of information that may be useful in a large multiplayer online RPG may be a specific dialog entered by the user during chat or conversational processing with other players / characters in the game. . For example, the dialog may indicate that the player is aggressive, disrespectful, polite, readable / writable, non-writable, influenced by the current culture or subculture. Also, the decisions made by the player can provide more detailed information, such as a risk-free, risk-averse, aggressive, passive, intelligent, follower, leader, etc. This information may be used and analyzed to assist in selecting and delivering more relevant advertisements to the user.

Further, the advertisement product may be an image similar to a banner advertisement, but the system may use an advertisement product that is the text and spoken language of characters that the player can talk to.
In the popular game series Simms (registered trademark), for example, a character with which the user has a conversation may suggest (as an advertisement) to listen to a newly released Coldplay album. The user can respond positively (if given an option) and listen to clips from the new Coldplay album. As another example, in a car racing game, after a user wrecked his Honda (R) Civic (R), for example, "If he had Hummer (R), he An announcer may be used to advertise by saying, "I would have been the winner of the battle."

User input may indicate a positive or negative response to the advertisement. For example,
In a Sims (registered trademark) type game, the advertisement may be a character saying "Would you like to listen to a new Coldplay album?" The “yes”, “definitely”, “absolute”, “really” responses are positive user responses (such as selection of text or banners on the web page) to the advertisement, while “no”, A response such as “no” may indicate a negative user response (such as clicking on a close box of an advertisement on a web page). Such user advertisement operations may be tracked and used for various purposes such as billing, billing status, advertisement scoring and the like. For example, the ratio of a particular user action or action group for ad impressions may be tracked and used in a manner similar to ad selection rate and / or ad conversion rate.

  The game can already have advertisements in place. For example, a game may come with all the different types of hundreds or thousands of advertisements already installed or loaded. This can be displayed in the game, as the ad may not be returned quickly enough, the game system is offline, the desired relevance cannot be determined, etc. It may be used to ensure that there are always available advertisements that do not interfere with play. These ads may be shipped with targeting criteria and on the user's game system to emulate how the ads are selected by a real ad server from an online connected game system. May be selected for advertisement display by a “lightweight” virtual advertisement server running at Thus, advertisements, and possibly targeting criteria and other advertisement information, may be configured on the same storage medium (eg, CD, ROM, DVD, etc.) as the video game.

  All of the current generation of popular video consoles (ie Playstation®, Xbox®, GameCube®, etc.) are all writable optical disc media (ie CD®, DVD®). ), BD®, etc.) and therefore state-based information and user information on a memory card (or some other non-volatile, readable and writable storage means) utilized by the console Is saved. This allows the player to save those games and possibly continue at a later time. With these memory cards, the player can store game information from many different games depending on the storage capacity of the card. Specifically, dozens of games can be saved. Information stored in this way may be considered as state information and provides a useful source of information for advertisers and the present invention. Specifically, by examining the memory card of the game system, each time the player connects online, the present invention (system) can examine the player's game history and stored state information. This can provide a large amount of information that can be used to better target advertising to the user. A game in which the user is currently running and interested can be determined. For example, if the user saves information from 10 games and 8 of the 10 games are racing games, the player is assumed to be a racing enthusiast and there are no car-related advertisements or players yet You may discover that advertisements for other possible racing games, etc. are useful. The system can even examine various game state bases and user information stored on the memory card. For example, if a player finds racing throughout a racing game stored on a memory card, mainly with BMW and a typical German car, the user is a BWM and German car enthusiast. You may guess that there is, and find that advertising for such cars is useful. As will be appreciated from the above, useful insights about the user may be obtained by examining the memory card of the game system.

  Many of the above representative implementations relate to video games, but embodiments consistent with the present invention can be used in other virtual or immersive environments.

  4.4: Example of operation in an exemplary embodiment consistent with the present invention

  FIG. 6 is a message transmission diagram illustrating the operation of an exemplary system consistent with the present invention. When generating an advertisement spot filling request, the advertisement spot filling operation 138 may accept game information 610, as indicated at 620. The game information 610 may comprise one or more of user input information 118, game state-based information 130, other game information 134 and user information (local) 126. Advertisement spot filling operation 138 can generate an advertisement request comprising at least a portion of advertisement information 610. The request can include other relevant information about the advertisement spot to be filled (eg, advertisement type, number of advertisements, when needed, etc.). As indicated at 630, the advertisement request is forwarded to the advertisement providing operation 172. As shown at 670 and 680, the advertisement provisioning operation 172 generates one or more related advertisements using the information provided in the request 630 (similar to the advertisement information 168, as shown at 690. As such, the advertisement can then be returned to the advertisement spot filling operation 138.

  Note that, as shown at 640, the advertisement providing operation 172 may query the user information providing operation 184. The user information providing operation 184 can obtain the requested user information (remote) 188 as indicated at 650 and the requested user information (remote) as indicated at 660 to the advertisement providing operation 172. ) Provide conversion.

  The game information may be different for different users. For example, consider a video game for virtual racing used by three (3) users A, B, and C. It is assumed that the user A chooses an outdoor, dusty (4 × 4 course) yellow H2 Hummer®, selects a male driver, and drives aggressively during the race. Assume that user B selects a city race, selects a pink based multi-colored, tuned Toyota Supra®, selects a female driver, and drives in the normal manner during the race. To do. Finally, User C selects Spain's Madrid World Cup track, selects multi-colored Audi R8R®, selects male drivers, and drives in a strategic manner during the race. Assume that.

Given the assumptions of the previous embodiment, suppose Dodge wants to advertise. It may comprise a variety of alternative advertisements with different serving constraints or targeting criteria. Assume further that it has a variable color by default value.
In this way, the system will provide a creative “Dodge RAM-Toe Truck” ad with a yellow track for user A, a “Dodge Neon Sport” ad creative with a pink car for user B, and a user For C, it is possible to show a creative “Dodge Viper” advertisement with a default color Dodge Viper. Suppose a ticket broker wants to advertise tickets for various events. The three advertisements for the three events, each with different offer constraints or targeting criteria, may be NFL football game tickets, Gwen Stepheni concert tickets, US Open Golf Tournament tickets. Thus, for the user A, the creative advertisement for the NFL football game ticket, the user B, the creative advertisement for the concert ticket of Gwen Steffani, and the user C, It is possible to show creative advertisements for US Open Golf Tournament tickets. As a final example, assume there are different advertising products for different television programs. The creative advertisement for the TV show “Fear Factor” is shown to user A, the creative advertisement for the TV show “American Idle” is shown to user B, and for “Nightly Business Report” The creative advertisement may be shown to the user C. As these embodiments illustrate, embodiments consistent with the present invention can be used to place more relevant and more useful advertisements for video game players. Such advertisements may be drawn at advertising spots within the video game, but instead or in addition, they may be drawn at advertising spots on other documents.

  Section 4.5: Conclusion

  As can be appreciated from the above, embodiments consistent with the present invention can be used to target in-game advertisements and to provide more relevant and useful advertisements in between. Embodiments consistent with the present invention can monitor user video game input to improve ad targeting and provide users with more relevant and useful advertisements.

FIG. 1 is a bubble diagram of representative operations that can be performed in a manner consistent with the present invention and information that can be used and / or generated by such operations. FIG. 2 is a flowchart of an exemplary method for implementing video game selection and play (eg, user video game conversational processing) that tracks actions in a manner consistent with the present invention. FIG. 3 is a flowchart of an exemplary method for performing an advertisement spot filling operation in a manner consistent with the present invention. FIG. 4 is a flowchart of an exemplary system for performing an advertisement providing operation in a manner consistent with the present invention. FIG. 5 is a block diagram of an exemplary apparatus capable of performing various operations of a method consistent with the present invention. FIG. 6 is a message transmission diagram illustrating the operation of an exemplary system consistent with the present invention.

Explanation of symbols

110 Video game system 114 Game play tracking operation 118 User input information 122 User information estimation operation (local)
126 User information (local)
134 Other game information 138 Advertisement spot filling operation 140 Network 150 Advertiser 160 Advertisement server 164 Advertisement information input and management operation 168 Advertisement information 172 Advertisement providing operation 176 Accounting / billing operation 180 User information server 184 User information providing operation 188 User information ( remote)
192 User game registration operation 196 User information estimation and storage operation

Claims (33)

a) generating an ad request;
b) sending the advertisement request to an advertisement server;
c) determining at least one advertisement in response to the advertisement request using at least video game information included in the advertisement request;
d) sending at least one advertisement to the video game device; and
e) rendering the at least one advertisement in a video game being played by the video game device;
And the advertisement request comprises the video game information.   The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the video game information included in the advertisement request comprises video game state-based information.   The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the video game information included in the advertisement request comprises interactive processing with a user's video game.   The conversational processing with the user's video game includes (A) user video game character selection, (B) user video game character clothing selection, and (C) user video game character physical attribute selection. The computer-implemented method of claim 3, comprising at least one.   The interactive processing of the user with the video game includes: (A) selecting the user's video game team, (B) selecting the user's video game sports player, and (C) selecting the user's video game stadium. The computer-implemented method of claim 3, comprising at least one.   The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the video game information included in the advertisement request comprises video game device location information.   The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the video game information included in the advertisement request comprises an identifier of a video game being played. -Tracking at least one of user selection and user game play;
-Estimating user characteristics from at least one tracked selection of the user and the user's game play;
Comprising
The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the advertisement request comprises at least some of the estimated user characteristics.   The computer-implemented method of claim 8, wherein estimating the user characteristics occurs on a video game device.   The computer-implemented method of claim 8, wherein estimating the user characteristics occurs in a system remote from the video game system.   The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the video game information is session information.   The computer-implemented method of claim 11, wherein the session information comprises at least one of (A) a start-up time, (B) a stop time, and (C) a downtime.   Determining the at least one advertisement comprises determining at least one related advertisement using the targeting information and the video game information from a plurality of advertisements having targeting information. The computer-implemented method of claim 1.   The computer-implemented method of claim 13, wherein the targeting information comprises a video game identifier.   The computer-implemented method of claim 13, wherein the targeting information comprises a video game type or genre.   The computer-implemented method of claim 13, wherein the targeting information comprises video game device location information.   The computer-implemented method of claim 13, wherein the targeting information comprises at least one date and time information.   The computer-implemented method of claim 13, wherein the targeting information comprises user information.   Determining the at least one advertisement includes scoring each of at least one related advertisement; and using the score to select the at least one advertisement from at least one related advertisement; The computer-implemented method of claim 13, further comprising: Each related advertisement has application information,
The computer-implemented method of claim 19, wherein scoring each of the at least one related advertisement uses the application information.   The computer-implemented method of claim 20, wherein the application information is an application for each ad impression in a video game.   The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein sending the advertisement request to an advertisement server occurs after the video game system is turned on and is responsive to the video game system being turned on. Method.   The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein sending the advertisement request is responsive to an ad spot that suddenly becomes available.   The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein sending the advertisement request is responsive to an advertisement spot that is made available more than a predetermined probability.   The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the video game information comprises information for a plurality of video games.   2. The computer according to claim 1, wherein the video game information comprises information of a plurality of video games stored on a nonvolatile readable and writable storage means in the video game device. The method performed. The advertising server is on a video game device;
The step of determining at least one advertisement in response to the advertisement request using at least the video game information provided in the advertisement request is performed in an advertisement server on the video game device. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein:   28. The at least one advertisement determined in response to the advertisement request is selected from a group of advertisements provided on a computer readable medium on which the video game is also stored. A computer-implemented method according to claim 1. a) tracking at least one of user selection and user play in the context of a video game;
b) estimating user characteristics from said at least one of tracked user selection and user play in the context of a video game; and
c) using the estimated user characteristics to determine relevant advertisements for the user;
A computer-implemented method comprising: a) generating an ad request;
b) sending the advertisement request to an advertisement server;
c) at least receiving at least one advertisement determined using the video game information provided in the advertisement request; and
d) rendering at least one advertisement in a video game being played by the video game device;
Comprising
The computer-implemented method, wherein the advertisement request includes the video game information. a) accepting an advertisement request;
b) responsive to the advertisement request to determine at least one advertisement using at least video game information included in the advertisement request; and
c) sending at least one advertisement to the video game device for rendering in a video game being played by the video game device;
Comprising
The computer-implemented method, wherein the advertisement request comprises the video game information. a) means for accepting advertisement requests;
b) in response to the advertisement request, means for determining at least one advertisement using at least the video game information included in the advertisement request; and
c) means for transmitting to the video game device at least one advertisement for drawing in the video game being played by the video game device;
Comprising
The apparatus, wherein the advertisement request includes the video game information. A computer-readable medium that stores computer-executable instructions that, when executed by a computer,
a) accepting an advertisement request;
b) responsive to the advertisement request to determine at least one advertisement using at least video game information included in the advertisement request; and
c) sending at least one advertisement to the video game device for rendering in a video game being played by the video game device;
The operation of
The computer-readable medium, wherein the advertisement request includes the video game information.

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