Google searching for in-game advertising

Mountain View (CA) - Google is eying a quickly developing market of advertising, as reports claim that Google is considering a bid to move into the world of advertising inside video games.

A recent Wall Street Journal report suggests that Google is in discussions with Adscape Media to acquire the company, and with it the chance to move into the increasingly popular world of in-game ads.

In the environment where advertisers are becoming frustrated with the increased ease of TV commercial skipping, while video game companies struggle with rising development costs, the two have met to create a new ground for product placement and virtual advertisements. Adscape Media is one of only a handful of companies well known for working in the relatively new market.

According to the report, Google has visions of moving beyond stale, pre-programmed advertising to allowing real-time ads to be constantly updated when a game is connected to the Internet.

A Google spokesperson was quoted as saying, "We are always considering new ways to extend Google’s advertising program to benefit our users, advertisers and publishers. In-game advertising offers one such possible extension among many others," reports the Journal.

A huge chunk of Google’s money comes from its dominance in online advertising, reaching annual ad revenues of billions of dollars. It has since tried to expand by opening up the doors to allowing people to buy advertising space in newspapers and on radio, both of which are currently still in the "testing" phase.