5 Hour live stream of the launch of Call of Duty MW3 across European territories.
View the video here
View the gallery here
Background
The Call of Duty series is a massive phenomenon with a loyal worldwide community, including over 1.2million facebook fans. On 7th November 2011 the next game in the Call of Duty Series, “Modern Warfare 3” or MW3 to it’s fans, went on sale at midnight. In just 5 days it broke all video game sale records, grossing £470 million and making it the biggest entertainment launch ever. The launch spanned multiple cities across Europe including London, Paris and Berlin, which feature in the game.
The Event
The main event was held at Old Billingsgate Market with celebrity and VIP guests (including Ashley Cole, Joey Barton, Katie Melua, Goldie, Jason Bradbury and Ortis Deley) and fans that had won tickets to attend. The evening featured Live consumer and celebrity European multi-player tournaments and music sets from the chart storming Example and duo Chase and Status. Reciprocal events were held in Paris and Berlin , featuring live satellite link-ups with London throughout the evening.
The Stream
The stream objectives were to create an immersive and participatory online experience for worldwide fans unable to attend the launch. The 5 hour live stream from 7pm – midnight was hosted by 6 presenters (including Rick Edwards and Danny Wallace) across the UK, France and Germany. The stream coverage included celebrity interviews, game-play, multi-player tournaments and live links from Paris and Berlin. In the run up to midnight, fans queuing at GAME on Oxford Street were featured, along with a live abseil stunt.
At Old Billingsgate Market, a TV studio was set-up at the venue to cover exclusive interviews including chart sensation Example and the game developers from Infinity Ward and Sledgehammer games.
The Technology
The event build, stream and derigg took place over just 24hrs. The set-up at Old Billingsgate market included a TV gallery to mix 7 radio linked roaming HD cameras and 3 HD satellite feeds from GAME, Paris and Berlin. All feeds were received and sent by a fly-away satellite dish built on the waterfront terrace. An exterior 30ft jib-mounted camera and roaming presenter-led crews captured VIP red carpet interviews. All footage was captured live for immediate edit to create an event highlights film just after midnight. Backup footage capture utilised the new PIX from Sound Devices and the Atomos Samurai. Both new devices coming to market the same week as the launch.
The stream was distributed through Livestream for PC, tablet and mobile viewing. It was hosted on Xbox Live, You Tube and Facebook. The pre-event trailer received over 460,000 Youtube hits.
The Results
2.2 million streams and 386,000 unique viewers on the night (breaking previous year of 180,000) 460,000 Youtube hits on the event trailer. Twitter trending #codmw3launch. £490 million of global sales in 5 days making it the biggest entertainment launch ever and a record for videogame sales.