The game ads they had to ban

By Justin Towell
published

We investigate the shocking ads that upset the censors

With the news that another game ad has been banned from UK screens (in this case a PS3 ad on Yahoo and British Telecom's internet site), we thought we'd take a look at some other game ads that caused uproar and see if the fuss is justified. Are they really so bad they have to be torn down and consigned to YouTube for ever more?

Take a look at "Kovac" in the PS3 ad below. This isn't the banned ad (that's long gone) butif you can imagine Kovac holding a knife and gun, with on-screen text saying "You on my side? Listen up I've killed for less. The music plays Puccini in my head," then you'll be close.

Above: Not suitable forfamily viewing? The guy does have a point though. Chocolate... that's deep, dude

Does that glorify violence? Would you kill someone every time you listened to Puccini having seen the ad? Do you even know what Puccini sounds like? No, we don't either. So let's move on.

Justin Towell
Justin Towell

Justin was a GamesRadar staffer for 10 years but is now a freelancer, musician and videographer. He's big on retro, Sega and racing games (especially retro Sega racing games) and currently also writes for Play Magazine, Traxion.gg, PC Gamer and TopTenReviews, as well as running his own YouTube channel. Having learned to love all platforms equally after Sega left the hardware industry (sniff), his favourite games include Christmas NiGHTS into Dreams, Zelda BotW, Sea of Thieves, Sega Rally Championship and Treasure Island Dizzy.