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"Hey gang," starts an email that I've obtained, sent to Activision employees this morning, penned by Activision Publishing CEO Eric Hirshberg. Hirshberg's email marks Activision's first company-wide internal acknowledgement of last week's Modern Warfare 3 leak on Kotaku.

The email's tone is not unlike the candid interview Hirshberg conducted with Joystiq about earlier this week. In fact, the Joystiq interview is actually referenced within the email.

"I wanted to reach out to you today and address the Call of Duty intellectual property leak that occurred last Friday," started Hirshberg. "Of course, Activision takes very seriously any abuse of our intellectual property – the event is under investigation and we’re confident it will be resolved quickly."

The email does not provide any details on where Activision suspects the leak came from. I've heard several theories, none of them with definitive proof. But with so many developers and outsourcing companies working on massive, fast-tracked projects like Modern Warfare 3--well, stuff happens.

"What I want to tell you about is how we handled the event internally," he continued. "We were lucky in that we were very close to our scheduled reveal date, and therefore, we had a number of assets that had not yet been released, but were ready to go."

Activision and Infinity Ward rolled out a series of teaser trailers to YouTube that evening. There have also been prominent advertisements running during the NBA conference finals, promising a revealing trailer next week. The companies pulled the very same marketing trick for 2009's Modern Warfare 2.

"When it came to light that we had suffered a significant security breach, it became clear that a leak of this size had the potential to throw our launch off of its schedule, or worse, blunt its momentum," he wrote. "As a company, we needed to look both backwards and forwards simultaneously. Of course we needed to immediately begin finding the source of the leak. But we also needed to deal with the fact that, like it or not, our launch had just begun."

StreamingProgressiveLowHighHDCall of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 "England" Teaser

The second of four Modern Warfare 3 teaser trailers.

Duder, it's over... Watch it again?Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 "Germany" TeaserCall of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 "France" TeaserCall of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 TeaserFind more Giant Bomb videos.EmbedDownloadTheater

Activision and Infinity Ward's decision to simply acknowledge the leak and move on was a smart, if rather unexpected move. With the "real" launch so close, the two could have just put their heads down. Instead, beginning the reveal allowed them to capitalize on traffic and attention otherwise on Kotaku.

"Our leadership team and key members of the Call of Duty team met to discuss strategy," he said. "I, for one, was incredibly proud of the team’s performance in that critical meeting. Instead of panicking, we took the fire of interest that had been started by the leak, and poured gasoline on it. Through Facebook, YouTube and Twitter, we released our four teasers (which were not scheduled to launch for another week) onto the web. With equal agility, our worldwide sales organizations managed to put both the retail and .com presale programs and assets into launch mode in no-time flat. Everybody involved delivered under pressure."

The announcement strategy for Modern Warfare 3 is not unlike the one for the last game.

Kotaku spoiled the goods--or parts of it--a week early. Some teasers would have begun rolling out this week, laying the viral groundwork for the official trailer during the NBA Finals.

"The result?" he said, numbers at the ready. "We had over 4.8 million hits on the various Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 teasers over those first 48 hours. To put that in perspective, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 and Call of Duty: Black Ops had 61,000 and 89,000 hits, respectively, in their first two days. Pre-sales for MW3 are off to an amazing start. Perhaps, most importantly, we migrated the dialogue from one that was between our players and the leakers, to one between our players and us."

Translation: Modern Warfare 3 is going to be huge. The Kotaku leak may have even helped fan the flames, as gamers descended upon the site and other blogs to learn "secret" details about the game.

"Very few companies could have woken up with a crisis of this magnitude, and gone to bed with an undeniable win," he concluded, echoing similar comments made to Joystiq. "Everyone should be extremely proud. We’ve got a long way to go. But under very challenging circumstances, we managed to get our launch off to an incredible start."

We expect to learn plenty more at a little thing called E3.

Filed under : Activision, Call of Duty, Modern Warfare, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 Login or sign up to comment on this topic. 114 Comments First To Last Latest 1 2 3 4 5 DefAde on May 20, 2011 I kinda wanna play this just to see how the silly story ends (if it is indeed the end)... but can't deny that my interest has been torn away by Battlefield 3 Napalm online on May 20, 2011 I don't know, man. I'm so used to dismissing Call Of Duty these days for being derivative and uninspired, that if they decide to tone up the action and pacing to the level of a, lets say, a Bad Boys II might provide, there is an opportunity I might be back on board. groin online on May 20, 2011 @Matte_G said:

Groin is just that... a dick.

That is correct. Commisar123 online on May 20, 2011 I'm still intrested in COD but this game will need to be special for me to buy it AjayRaz on May 20, 2011 reveal trailer?! yes, please! Funkydupe on May 20, 2011 How long can they keep making these? Jimbo on May 20, 2011 You're saying this *ahem* leak didn't turn out so bad for them after all?  Well knock me down with a feather. Stealthmaster86 on May 20, 2011
Once they find the one that leaked it, they will be fired. somejerk online on May 20, 2011 Hurm. Did they ever figure out who at Crytek leaked that PC alpha/beta development package then? vizionblind on May 20, 2011 bring on battlefield 3 vaportra1l on May 20, 2011 I was just thinking about this the other day when I saw the commercial during the NBA playoffs and how they were handling this leak....  They just ended up rolling out trailers early rather than acting like the leak never happened and/or trying to figure out who to sue. 

But anyways, I was ready to write off this game after BLOPS, but I think I may be back on board but we'll see.  The info in the leak definitely perked my interest, and if they tweak the multiplayer somewhat, they have my money. XChairmanDrekX on May 20, 2011 It can't be that big of a deal, big whoop someone said MW3 is coming out.   What a surprise... Would I get in trouble for saying that the earth revolves around the sun? dvorak on May 20, 2011 I feel like it's basically obligatory as a fan of FPS games to get this. It's going to be up to a certain standard that will make it worthwhile to play the single-player, and to me, the price of a new game justifies the all new multi-player content. The formula might be the same in the end, but I'm alright with just a refreshed set of content each year. 
That's worth $60 to me. I spend that much on far worse games and stupid stuff. It might not be groundbreaking, but "good enough" is good enough for me when it comes to the Call of Duty franchise.

COD4 and MW2 stole the "Madden of First Person Shooters" title from Halo, and while I'm super interested in seeing what can steal it away from MW3 and it's successors, I'm okay with where we are now. crusader8463 online on May 20, 2011 @XChairmanDrekX said:

It can't be that big of a deal, big whoop someone said MW3 is coming out.   What a surprise... Would I get in trouble for saying that the earth revolves around the sun?

Only if you count being burned at the stake for stating such heresy trouble. FluxWaveZ on May 20, 2011 Wow, so instead of the Kotaku leak hindering them, it helped them tremendously. That's incredible. Good on them for doing what needed to be done instead of ignoring the leak as if nothing happened. MrOldboy on May 20, 2011 @XChairmanDrekX said:

It can't be that big of a deal, big whoop someone said MW3 is coming out.   What a surprise... Would I get in trouble for saying that the earth revolves around the sun?

I dont know if the announcement that the game existed was really surprising. It was that it was an information leak with very specific details about the game. If you look back at how activision markets the call of duty games; they like to deliver info in bit sized chunks to keep the marketing momentum growing. They had a "special" event just to show off the multiplayer for the first time and people ate that shit up. Like it wasn't going to be like the last year's game. Ghost407 on May 20, 2011 Those numbers are fucking crazy... schattenwolf86 on May 20, 2011 @XChairmanDrekX said:

It can't be that big of a deal, big whoop someone said MW3 is coming out.   What a surprise... Would I get in trouble for saying that the earth revolves around the sun?

Did you see the info leaked on Kotaku?  The whole story was revealed.  A very detailed account at that.  It's one thing to say  "MW3 is coming out" and another to say "we have all the info on the story for MW3." 

I doubt little will change for the final story for MW3, Robert Bowling did say that some of the content leaked wasn't 100% correct, but he could be bluffing as well. Ghost407 on May 20, 2011 @Funkydupe said:

How long can they keep making these?

HAHA, for a very very long time, if they continue to sell even a fraction of what they've sold... Altersparck on May 20, 2011 Say what you will about Activision, but they know how to work the PR magic. Sony could learn a thing or two from them (and Microsoft, Nintendo, Apple, etc...) First To Last Latest 1 2 3 4 5 Quick Look EX: Retro/GradeIt's a shooter but backwards and also guitars woo! Quick Look: The Witcher 2We live out CD Projekt's dark fantasy sequel. Video Review: L.A. NoireWho's going to clean up Los Angeles? You? Popular News most viewed most commented Sony Responds to Criticisms of PlayStation Network's 'Welcome Back' Lineup If you already own all the PS3 and PSP games on the list, you might be a little peeved.

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