The mobile version of YouTube is becoming infamous in some circles for the abundance of strangely similar mobile game ads. Not only can they be annoying, but thefake ads and trailersrarely bear any resemblance to the actual product.
Now, one YouTube channel claims many of the ads may rise to the level of a criminal offense. The only problem is getting the relevant authorities to holdmobilegame developers accountable.
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The YouTube channel Game Theory uploaded a video on March 30th discussing typical mobile game ads and how they likely violate FTC. Most gamers who watch YouTube have probably come across such ads before. Often low budget and poorly made, they usually adhere to the same handful of formats. One common and currently popular variant is “pull the pin” logic puzzles, where the player must pull pins to clear a path for the character to reach a reward. A game like that calledHero Rescuedoes exist, however, resembling its ads makes it an exception to the norm.
Game Theory singled out the mobile gameGardenscapes,whosemisleading ads were banned in the UK last year. The game is essentiallyCandy Crushwith some light town-building elements thrown in. However, the ads use the same “pull the pin” template described above. These puzzles only actually appear as random and incredibly rare mini-games that make up less than 1% of the actual gameplay.
Gardenscapesis not even the worst offender when it comes to alleged false advertising. The trailer for one mobile game brought up in the video outright steals footage fromBanished,a medieval city builder on PC. The ad doesn’t even bother to hide the obvious mouse interface. And that’s far from the only example of low effort mobile games stealing footage from PC titles. It’s not even a new tactic, as mobile strategy games have been impersonatingAge of Empires 2for years.
According to Game Theory, these practices aren’t just unethical, but also illegal. The video cites a page on FTC.gov explaining the Federal Trade Commission’s rules for advertising. According to federal law, advertisers cannot deliberatelylie or mislead their audienceabout their product. Another line says that the rule applies no matter where the ad appears. That doesn’t leave much of a loophole for these mobile game devs to crawl through.
It also means that mobile developers are potentially opening themselves up to fines and other legal action for fake ads. However, the critical word here is “potentially." As the video points out, any legal action is wholly dependent on the government caring about the issue, and theFTC rarely bothers to go after mobile games or appsfor false advertising. Freemium or ad-supported games like those discussed in the video are even less of a priority.
Effectively, the law does not apply to these games because the FTC doesn’t consider them worth the Commission’s time. So criminal or not, these annoyingly misleading ads may be sticking around for a while.
