Ad description
An in-game ad for the My Passion Novels and Romance app, an online romantic novel service, seen on 1 July 2025 in a game app called Wood Away, a puzzle game.
The ad was presented as an e-book page, and featured a computer-generated background image of a man wearing a suit and a woman wearing a dress, holding each other closely with their eyes closed and their heads touching.
Text stated “[…] he held me up by my throat and snarled in my face […] ‘You will not reject me. I am your owner and I tell you what to do and when.’ He threw me on the ground. I struggled to catch my breath and tears ran down my face freely […] I haven’t done anything to deserve this. Jasmine howled in pain at my head and I doubled over in pain clutching at my chest. I just want this to be over and done with […] ‘You’re just a worthless bitch that nobody will love […] You’re a whore that will die alone because no one wants to be with you,’ she spat in my face and kicked me in the ribs with her heals […] Her minions held me up as she slapped me repeatedly and punched me in the stomach […]”.
The ad featured an app store link at the bottom, which stated “My Passion: Novels and Romance Read love & romantic stories”.
Issue
The complainant, who believed the ad featured references to sexual violence towards and the physical assault of a woman, challenged whether it:
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was harmful, offensive and irresponsible; and
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had been irresponsibly targeted.
Response
1. & 2. HW Fantasy Ltd t/a My Passion said they targeted a mature audience and communicated this to AppLovin, the ad network service which was used by the Wood Away game to serve advertising. They said they had no direct relationship with Wood Away. They said their internal automated systems were configured to maintain content authenticity while applying appropriate targeting measures. They said they also had relied on the targeting measures in the AppLovin ad network service.
They said the licensing agreements they had with the authors they worked with required faithful representation of the author's original work and any significant modifications to the source text would constitute a breach of their obligations. They said the content of their advertising was quoted texts from published authors who were distributed through legitimate platforms such as Amazon. They said that romance fiction, including paranormal subgenres, represented a legitimate industry with established marketing practices.
They said the text was a passive narrative, which did not encourage emulation or harmful behaviour. They said the content addressed themes of conflict, adversity and character development, which were typical dramatic tools used across literature, film and other media.
They said the excerpts in the ad featured a clearly fantastical element that established a fictional context, and included references to fantasy tropes and the supernatural. They said these elements functioned as genre signifiers that readers would have recognised as markers of paranormal fantasy rather than realistic scenarios. The ad was designed to intrigue readers who were already familiar with paranormal romance storytelling conventions and thematic elements. They said that while the text might have been concerning in isolation, readers would understand from the context of the ad that the text was depicting a fictional scene.
AppLovin said their content restriction policies included prohibitions on ads that could be considered explicit or otherwise highly suggestive. They said their advertisers agreed to comply with those prohibitions and restrictions, as well as all applicable laws and regulations, and were aware non-compliance could result in the pausing of ads or even banning of accounts.
They also said that after being notified of this complaint, they removed the ad from their network.
Assessment
1. & 2. Upheld
The CAP Code stated that ads must be prepared with a sense of responsibility to consumers and to society, and must not cause serious or widespread offence.
The ASA understood that Wood Away was a simple puzzle game, which a recommended age-rating of 4+, that we considered was likely to have appeal to a general audience, including to children.
We considered that some adults who saw the ad were likely to understand that the text was taken from a published novel, which was a fictional narrative, and that the text was illustrative of the novel’s genre and content.
However, the excerpts selected for, and reproduced in, the ad described explicit situations in which a woman was subjected to violence by multiple people, some of which was implied to be of a sexual nature, degradation and both verbal and physical abuse. Notwithstanding that many readers would understand that the ad was for an online romance novel app, and the ad was an extract of one of the fictional novels offered by the app, we considered that the content of the ad trivialised and condoned the serious subject of violence against women.
For those reasons we concluded the ad was irresponsible, was likely to cause both serious and widespread offence, and had been irresponsibly targeted, because it was not suitable to be published in any game. We concluded the ad breached the Code.
The ad breached CAP Code (Edition 12) rules 1.3 (Social responsibility), and 4.1 (Harm and offence ).
Action
The ad must not appear again in its current form. We told My Passion to ensure that their ads were socially responsible and did not cause serious or widespread offence, including not to trivialise or condone the serious subject of violence against women.
