The huge problem here is not just that there's a blatant ad in a SimCity game. Product placements and tie-ins are actually pretty common in Facebook games. Advergames date back to the '80s.
The deeper problem is that SimCity is being presented as a relatively serious simulation. The mechanics of the game are intended to represent an approximation of the real world. People will learn about how the world works through playing the game--I know that I learned about zoning and traffic engineering and a whole host of urban problems through the original SimCity. And so did a lot of other people.
In fact, a lot of people recognized early on that SimCity had the potential to educate and influence a lot of people. It's even been criticized on the ground that it limits the ways that the various problems can be approached, for example disallowing alternate methods of taxation to completely replace property tax. (Ian Bogost has argued that the best way to deal with this is procedural literacy, that is, learning to critically read a game system like we would a book or a film.)
Introducing a magic electric car recharging station isn't just a tasteless ad. It's deliberate propaganda. Even if you support the cause (more electric cars) the way the system works subverts the basic mechanics of the game. This isn't like Maxis adding the recycling centers to SimCity 3000, or the way that nuclear power has always been risky since the first SimCity. Don't forget, this isn't just any electric car, this is a "Nissan LEAF(R)". Players who play the game with this DLC will be subjected to the continual message that adding a Nissan(TM) charging station to their city makes everything better, with no downsides. That may be an agreeable message if it gets us more electric cars, but it subverts the basic urban simulation model in service of propaganda. Imagine if it was, say, Shell or BP doing this with a regular filling station. Or McDonalds. And you'll note that Tesla doesn't have a SimCity recharging station...
Even players who see through the transparent propaganda will be influenced by it, in the same way that advertizing always influences our behavior, even when we realize that it is having an effect on us.
And for the subset of the player who might be skeptical about electric cars, this building also won't help. Because the building has no downsides, what happens when the player learns more about the real world and realizes that there are, in fact, problems that such a building would create (like drawing down a lot more power than just the solar panels can provide). Disillusionment is bad for advocacy. The resulting cynicism won't just sour them on Nissan, it'll sour them on electric cars in general.
If they had created a more balanced building (or even a whole system of electric cars and public transportation) supported by Nissan as an in-game ad it would be less disturbing, because it would fit with the system and be a less transparent cash-in. (On the other hand, there's something to be said for the blatant transparency, since at least it's blindingly obvious propaganda.)
The deeper problem is that SimCity is being presented as a relatively serious simulation. The mechanics of the game are intended to represent an approximation of the real world. People will learn about how the world works through playing the game--I know that I learned about zoning and traffic engineering and a whole host of urban problems through the original SimCity. And so did a lot of other people.
In fact, a lot of people recognized early on that SimCity had the potential to educate and influence a lot of people. It's even been criticized on the ground that it limits the ways that the various problems can be approached, for example disallowing alternate methods of taxation to completely replace property tax. (Ian Bogost has argued that the best way to deal with this is procedural literacy, that is, learning to critically read a game system like we would a book or a film.)
Introducing a magic electric car recharging station isn't just a tasteless ad. It's deliberate propaganda. Even if you support the cause (more electric cars) the way the system works subverts the basic mechanics of the game. This isn't like Maxis adding the recycling centers to SimCity 3000, or the way that nuclear power has always been risky since the first SimCity. Don't forget, this isn't just any electric car, this is a "Nissan LEAF(R)". Players who play the game with this DLC will be subjected to the continual message that adding a Nissan(TM) charging station to their city makes everything better, with no downsides. That may be an agreeable message if it gets us more electric cars, but it subverts the basic urban simulation model in service of propaganda. Imagine if it was, say, Shell or BP doing this with a regular filling station. Or McDonalds. And you'll note that Tesla doesn't have a SimCity recharging station...
Even players who see through the transparent propaganda will be influenced by it, in the same way that advertizing always influences our behavior, even when we realize that it is having an effect on us.
And for the subset of the player who might be skeptical about electric cars, this building also won't help. Because the building has no downsides, what happens when the player learns more about the real world and realizes that there are, in fact, problems that such a building would create (like drawing down a lot more power than just the solar panels can provide). Disillusionment is bad for advocacy. The resulting cynicism won't just sour them on Nissan, it'll sour them on electric cars in general.
If they had created a more balanced building (or even a whole system of electric cars and public transportation) supported by Nissan as an in-game ad it would be less disturbing, because it would fit with the system and be a less transparent cash-in. (On the other hand, there's something to be said for the blatant transparency, since at least it's blindingly obvious propaganda.)