Players aren’t happy with Xbox’s forced fullscreen ads

Nor should they be.

Update [22 January 2024]: Another month, another ad. This time, players who booted up their Xbox over the weekend were greeted with a fullscreen ad asking them to head over to YouTube to watch the recent Xbox Developer Direct.

“The Xbox consoles are not and never were advertised or sold as a subsidized device, but the ads are sure making it feel like one,” wrote Twitter’s K-Med in response to the new ad, which can be seen above.

“This feels akin to getting an Amazon Kindle at a discount because its ad supported.”

“ANOTHER full screen ad before getting to the dashboard,” wrote GremlinLord615. “I guess this is the new thing now on Xbox. Xbox very disappointing.”

Update [16 December 2023]: Another day, another ad. This time, players who boot up their Xbox consoles will receive a fullscreen ad touting holiday sales across games, TV and film.

You can see the new fullscreen ad below.

The ad appears to be relatively new — we’ve spotted only one Reddit post about it so far, and perhaps surprisingly, those commenting appear to be on side with the ad.

“I don’t know, maybe I’m just a slave to the corporate overlords, but who cares? Just hit exit. I don’t want ads either but they’re everywhere. Streaming, before films, anything on television or YouTube, it’s just how they try to make more and more cash,” wrote OrangeBomb7.

“I don’t like it, but it’s not enough to make me switch consoles or care,” the user continued. “If enough people ignore it and don’t engage maybe it’ll go away and they’ll have to find a different method. Or just switch to a different console if it’s that egregious.”

“PC might have bloatware and stuff preincluded but you don’t get pop-up ads unless you have a virus,” countered user IndyPFL.

What’s your take on this most recent ad?

Original story [4 November 2023]: Players are unhappy with both Xbox and Microsoft’s newly acquired Activision Blizzard after booting up their consoles to see a forced fullscreen Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3 ad.

The fullscreen ad encourages players to either buy Modern Warfare 3‘s regular or Vault editions, and comes complete with an “Exit” button that must be used to get to the Xbox home screen.

Users took to Reddit with their displeasure — not only with this ad, but with ads across the Xbox ecosystem.

“Crazy that I’m paying a fortune for a console and it has built in ads now,” wrote Mujury.

“I remember creating a USA gamertag to get access to some games that weren’t available in my country, and signing in to that account for the first time was overwhelming,” added Aquatic-Vocation. “[F]ull-page NFL ads, sour patch kids ads, doritos ads. I never understood what people meant when they complained about ads on the dashboard because we just didn’t get any of that in my country, but damn. Y’all had it rough.”

Others pointed out similar practices within Windows’ lock screen, though others were quick to point out some of those features can be disabled in settings.

“The issue is you shouldn’t have to constantly bend over backwards and go out of your way (along with constantly changing the way you’re doing it) to stop full screen pop-up ads in software you paid for (Windows),” reads a counter to those arguements from ButTheTechStack.

Frankly, this writer thinks the outrage being expressed on Reddit is spot on; after spending $800 AUD on a console — and recently having key customisation features ripped from the Xbox home screen — having ads like this (let alone on the home screen) is a bridge too far.

Where do you sit in this debate? Sound off in the comments section, below.

Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3 is planned for a 10 November release on Windows PC, Xbox One, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, PS4 and PS5. Pre-orders also get one week of early access to its campaign.

Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3 10 November 2023 PC PS4 PS5 Xbox One Xbox Series S & X   Buy on Windows PC via Steam Buy on Windows PC via Battle.net Buy on Xbox via Microsoft Store