It seems Madison Avenue is increasingly looking to video games for inspiration. First we see the world of Grand Theft auto transformed by a coke, and today we stumble across an ad for American Express that pits Andy Roddick against the paddle from Pong. The tennis pro has some trouble getting the ball past the massive white rectangle that covers nearly half the width of the court, but ends up besting the eponymous paddle with some ingenuity.The whole thing kind of reminded us of this recent piece on universally accessible games, which featured an example of a 3D player-model taking on a simplified Pong game. Is the American Express ad department reading Joystiq for ideas? Probably not... but just in case, we're still waiting for the ad in which Mario has to spend his hard-earned coins on late fees and ballooning interest payments.
