A new virtual reality (VR) videogame has snuck its way onto the Oculus Store for Oculus Rift without much fanfare. New preview events, no announcement and very little in the way of promotional activities, Mountain Goat Mountain has seen a peculiar launch. However, with the videogame coming from Zynga and ushering-in the era of in-game advertising for VR, it could be quite obvious as to why a storm hasn’t been created for Mountain Goat Mountain.
An arcade-style platform videogame mimicking the likes of Gottlieb’s 1982 classic Q*Bert, Mountain Goat Mountain has the player bouncing around a cube-based world attempting to collect coins while avoiding falling rocks and logs, water streams and lightning clouds. The coins can be used to purchase new goats with which to play, and as might be expected for a free-to-play videogame a daily allotment of coins is offered for free.
However, Mountain Goat Mountain also offers coins in a secondary promotional manner: through advertising. After a certain amount of time playing the videogame, a pop-up will appear offering a bonus level in which coins can be collected with near-every step taken. In VRFocus’ experience, this opportunity to gain bonus coins was apparently provided by Progressive; an insurance company based in North America.
The advertisement isn’t particularly intrusive – the player can opt to simply ignore it, if they so wish – and at present there is no option to purchase coins via a microtransaction with real-world currency.
Mountain Goat Mountain is based on an Android and iOS videogame of the same name, bringing this popular title to VR for the first time on the Oculus Rift. VRFocus will deliver a review of Mountain Goat Mountain very soon, with the videogame available as a free-to-play experience now.
