Periscope Could Be Preparing an Apple TV App

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For months now, Periscope has dominated on the live-streaming front. Ever since Twitter introduced the competitive app a few months ago, it’s been a big hit with fans, even getting to the point that it easily eclipsed its biggest competitor, Meerkat. But now, it appears that Twitter could be bringing the application to a whole new audience Apple TV viewers.

A report from TechCrunch suggests that Periscope is hard at work on a new app devoted to Apple’s newest version of its TV-connected device, allowing users to watch live streams straight from their television a far cry from having to do so on smaller mobile devices.

This ties in with today’s Apple TV announcement, which comes with an Apple TV App Store featuring a number of applications produced by third party developers. While games are set to take the big focus with the store, that doesn’t mean that other types of services can’t be introduced and that’s where Periscope’s app fits right in.

Periscope previously made live streams viewable through a computer (desktop of laptop) without the need to set up a broadcast channel, so chances are the application will work the same way, with the ability to easily locate favorite steams by country (and region). With 10 million registered users (and climbing), there should be no problem finding content to watch even though some it may be questionable, like illegal live streams of the Mayweather/Pacquiao fight from earlier this year.

The Periscope app could very well provide a new way for Apple TV to draw in consumers, as it would provide so much more than the routine streaming services like Netflix and Hulu. With its large live viewing community (as well as an array of broadcasters), it could easily expand its audience, especially those who want to watch its streams on a bigger format. Other services could also be introduced perhaps even a way, sometime in the future, to broadcast from the Apple TV device with games. (Granted, a camera would be necessary, and there’s no word yet if the new device would be compatible with those.)

Regardless, it appears that Periscope could be ready for a new kind of show and you can bet people will tune in.

 

Now Hiring This Week: September 9th

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[a]listdaily is your source for the hottest job openings for senior management and marketing in games, entertainment and social media. Check here every Wednesday for the latest openings.

  • Square Enix – Central Digital Marketing Manager, Global Media (El Segundo, Calif.)
  • Disney Interactive – Manager, Social Media (Glendale, Calif.)
  • The Hershey Company – Director of North America Digital Marketing (Hershey, Pennsylvannia)
  • Warner Bros. Records – VP Marketing (Burbank, Calif.)
  • Ayzenberg – Digital Marketing Beat Writer (Pasadena, Calif.)
  • Ayzenberg – Account Executive (Pasadena, Calif.)
  • Ayzenberg – Media Planner (Pasadena, Calif.)

For last week’s [a]list jobs postings, click here. Have a position you’d like to place with us Email us at pr@ayzenberg.com.

Previewing the New Apple TV: Industry Experts Weigh In

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Apple is holding its now traditional September event to introduce new iPhones tomorrow, but there are several important differences to note. First, Apple is holding this event in the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium in San Francisco, which has roughly ten times the amount of space as its usual venue — and they’re not inviting any more press people than usual. What could be the reason for this extra space The rumors from multiple sources converge on one main reason: The debut of the new, upgraded Apple TV, and the need to provide adequate space to give the press hands-on experience with the devices.

Certainly Apple will be talking about many exciting new devices, software and services at this event, but the Apple TV is getting most of the attention. The device, which has sold over 25 million units so far, has been called a “hobby” by Apple, and not something worthy of the company’s serious attention. That’s about to change in a big way tomorrow, with a potentially a major impact on the games industry. In fact, The New York Times reported on the device this weekend with the headline “New Apple TV is Said to Focus on Games, Challenging Traditional Consoles.”

The rumors say the new Apple TV will be powered by a version of Apple’s A8 CPU/GPU combo, with either eight or 16 GB of RAM for $149. The new remote that comes with the Apple TV will have full Siri voice control, a touchpad, two or more buttons, and motion-sensors inside it. The combination could provide plenty of interesting control possibilities for games, and the Apple TV will also support a variety of third-party controllers with a full array of traditional console controls. Most importantly, the Apple TV will finally have its own App Store, so developers can provide endless apps for the device — which, of course, means thousands of games in short order. Existing mobile games should be easy to port, and new games could be created specifically for the device.

The [a]listdaily asked a number of industry leaders and analysts about the potential impact of the new Apple TV on the games industry, and found no particular consensus. “Apple’s all-in commitment to support games on the iPhone was one of the biggest surprises ever in the game business, and has been the driver of this ‘golden age of gaming,'” noted Bing Gordon, general partner and chief product officer at leading venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers (and formerly chief creative officer at EA for many years). “If Apple brings this level of energy and expertise to TV, it will be great for gamers.”

That’s a much more positive view than research analyst Michael Pachter of Wedbush Securities holds. “I don’t think most people give it a lot of upside,” said Pachter. “Apple TV can’t handle anything more than mobile games unless they wrestle with the same problems faced by OnLive. If they can’t get streaming of robust games to work real-time, they’re stuck with asynchronous mobile games. While I’m sure people will play mobile games on their TVs, it isn’t that much more immersive than playing on a tablet, and Fire TV Stick and Chromecast both let you do the same thing. The installed base of Apple TV users is an asset, but it’s not clear to me that people are dying to play Flappy Bird on their TVs.”

Apple TV concept art

Taking a more measured view, SuperData CEO Joost van Dreunen saw the potential in the numbers. “Given those assumptions, at first glance an updated Apple TV with a focus on games appears pregnant with promise,” said van Dreunen. “Certainly, the market for iOS-based games is substantial at almost $5B in revenues in the US and at a price point of $150 USD it is within the reach for a large addressable market.”

Still, van Dreunen also sees the potential pitfalls, and they are not trivial. “That said, it lacks appeal for the bulk of the mobile gaming audience,” van Dreunen continued. “Mobile gamers are just that: They prefer to play on their smartphone or tablet and are much less likely to play on a big screen in their living room. Console gamers, on the other hand, which are in the habit of spending hundreds of dollars on a dedicated device are looking at an action-packed holiday season with a slew of releases coming up. Even if they’d consider playing Angry Birds on the big screen, which they won’t, they’ve already spent their money on a next gen console and are eagerly awaiting to fill out their library with new titles. Without either of these audiences buying into gaming on the Apple TV, it will likely remain a smaller business for Apple.”

Wanda Meloni, founder of M2 Research, thinks that Apple’s opportunity was far better years ago. “At the consumer level Apple TV has the potential to make an impact with a certain demographic – families with young children. Outside of that I’m not sure how they will be perceived by consumers,” Meloni said. “I would have liked to have seen Apple enter the market several years ago. From a developer standpoint I think Apple has been very much a walled-garden. If they want to get developers support they need to start engaging with developers more directly.”

“M2 Advisory Group researched developers and our findings showed that many developers were planning to move development from iOS to other platforms such as Steam and Sony,” Meloni continued. “What we are seeing right now is an ecosystem in flux as developers are unable to sustain raising acquisition costs on top of 30 percent revenue share. It’s driving them to explore other platforms to develop for and there are a number of competitors they will need to content with including Amazon, Sony, Google, Valve/Steam, and Razer/Ouya.”

Clearly no one expects the Apple TV to easily conquer the gaming market. Equally, though, no one is counting Apple out of the potential to sell tens of millions or even hundreds of millions of Apple TVs over time, creating a very large market for games. It’s worth realizing that on a technical level, the new Apple TV equals or surpasses the capability of Nintendo’s Wii console (in everything but storage space) that sold over 180 million units, mostly on the strength of easy to play games like Wii Sports that brought in a very wide demographic. Apple’s got an enormous audience of over 800 million iOS users (and their credit card data!), a vast library of games, and plenty of other strong reasons for people to purchase an Apple TV (such as the rumored bundle of cable channels that will be offered next year, which could precipitate a cord-cutting revolution).

The two key factors that could drive the success of the new Apple TV are Apple’s level of support for the platform as a game console, and the level of support from developers. Successful consoles usually have unique experiences (“exclusives”) that are so compelling they drive people to buy the console. Apple could arrange for those — a $1 billion investment in getting top developers to create exclusives (which is less than one percent of Apple’s cash on hand) could create dozens of compelling games youd find nowhere else. That seems like an unlikely move based on Apple’s past history, but the latest rumor making the rounds has Apple considering investing in original video content for the Apple TV, much as Netflix and Amazon have done with award-winning series like House of Cards. If Apple could do that, why not some amazing games as well

Finally, much of what Apple TV might become as a game platform is up to developers. Will big publishers port hit games like Call of Duty or Madden NFL to Apple TV Will smaller studios get creative and do something ground-breaking on this new device Or will we just see a stream of quick-and-dirty ports of existing mobile games to pick up a little extra revenue, and no great games that really create enthusiasm and passion

There’s no telling which way this will go right now, but the event should provide some clues, and the rest of this year will give us more information to go on.

Snapchat Users Can Find Brand Content Skippable

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The Snapchat service has proven to be a boon to certain brands, mainly due to its effective reach to millions of users on a daily basis. However, if these brands aren’t considerate over what kind of ads they put together, they could find themselves in danger of being skipped over.

Digiday reports that a lot of users tend to move on quickly from ads that don’t keep their attention. Although this isn’t the same for all brands across the board — no one else has reported on the site’s advertising trends — but the site does run 10-second ads with the ability to skip over them, indicating that making them ‘skippable’ makes them an important factor when it comes to sales.

As you can see from the chart below, there are four different examples as to when users watched ads. Each time, it appears that the percentage of viewers watching said ads after a certain number of seconds drops almost instantly, in just a matter of two seconds or more. Only around 10 percent seem to watch the ad in its entirety.

“Completion rates for Snapchat vary depending on the creativity of the ad,” said an anonymous partner with Snapchat. “Most brands that try to be native, organic to the platform, have higher completion rates.

Some brands, as a result, are looking for more favorable viewability standards from the company. They haven’t answered, though, as the advertising model, charging for ones that even run for less than a second, remains in place.

Snapchat is aware of such concerns, according to Digiday. “It’s early days,” Snapchat said in an email. “We are very focused on continuing to drive value for advertisers.”

Even with the small amount of time spent with video ads, the platform can still be quite effective.

Ad Targeting Is Increasing Facebook’s Market Share

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Facebook has come a long way with its advertising game over the past few years, even most recently introducing more elaborate ads that make proper use of the mobile space. And it intends to increase its share of advertising budgets even further, in the hopes of making even bigger revenue.

A report from Mediapost indicates that the social site is set to make approximately $12.14 billion in U.S. digital ad revenue by the year 2017, according to numbers provided by eMarketer. While Google will still continue to be at the forefront of mobile, Facebook will show an increasing rate that will narrow the gap in just a couple years time.

The report shows that Facebook will increase its market share from 13.2 percent for this year up to 16.1 percent by 2017.

As it continues to leverage its unique targeting capabilities, we expect Facebook to increase its share of ad budgets from brands, direct response advertisers and small businesses, said eMarketer analyst Martin Utreras regarding the report.

In comparison, Google will still have a hearty share of the market, but it will lose a little bit of ground, dropping from 40.1 percent for this year down to 35.4 percent in 2017.

As far as Facebook s outreach with ads, mobile will continue to be at the forefront, with 77 percent of its digital ad revenue coming from mobile for this year. By 2017, that will grow to 85 percent.

Part of that revenue strength will come from Facebook s partner site Instagram. In the coming quarters, we expect Instagram and video ads monetization to keep increasing Facebook s share of the display ad market, said Utreras.

Instagram is a monetary giant in itself, set to make $570 million in advertising for this year, more than ten percent of Facebook s overall mobile ad revenues. By 2017, it will get even larger, growing to $2.39 billion approximately 28 percent of the company s overall mobile ad revenues.

Facebook as a whole will generate $7.66 billion in display ad revenue for this year a 44.9 percent increase over last year s numbers. Meanwhile, Google will rake in $4.11 billion in display ads which is a smaller increase by 19 percent. However, keep in mind that display ads only play a minor part of Google s advertising picture, accounting for only 17.6 percent of total ad revenues.

It ll be interesting to see how this growth continues in the years beyond especially with effective ads.

Kabam Strikes Back With ‘Star Wars: Uprising’

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With Star Wars: The Force Awakens just months away from release, and various Star Wars-licensed products hitting store shelves (including Disney Infinity 3.0), it seems like Disney s sci-fi franchise is coming back stronger than ever. And anyone that has a product that ties into it will be benefitting from the results including Kabam, a mobile game company producing what could be its biggest licensed hit to date with Star Wars: Uprising.

As reported by VentureBeat, the mobile publishers teamed up with LucasFilm on the game, as well as various members of the Extended Universe s seasoned veterans to make it more authentic. “It’s extremely exciting. Being the first canon thing that was worked on at all post-Jedi was a huge opportunity,” said Daniel Erickson, the director of Star Wars: Uprising. “The respect and sort of trust that it shows from Lucasfilm that hey, we’re going to let this come out as in a game format, says a lot about what we’re trying to do with it and, obviously, the talent we brought in to do it.”

The game, like the recently released Star Wars: Aftermath before it, ties in events that occurred between the original film trilogy and the forthcoming The Force Awakens. Erickson states that the story happens in the places we love in The Empire Strikes Back.

[Uprising and Aftermath] sort of button. “There are things that overlap,” said Erikson. “We had some pretty serious discussions with some of the canon characters and where they were and when they were. Lucasfilm brings everyone together very well. We have a little timeline and pow-wows.”

Erickson knows his Star Wars content well, previously serving as a creative director for Star Wars: The Old Republic from BioWare a game many consider strong in the Star Wars canon.

He insists that a major reason that Star Wars games like Old Republic and Uprising are so loyal to the brand are because of LucasFilm s involvement. They keep a much tighter control than they used to on making sure everything connects to everything else, Erickson said. “All of the original pitch came from us. Lucasflim came back and then said, Are you aware of the following 700 things. And then we started putting the connections together.”

“In the early days, we were not interconnected with other parts of Star Wars lore because those parts had not yet been determined. There was still enough stuff in flux about the new movie, about the new books, etc. As all of the various parts of, let s say, everything surrounding this between [Return of the Jedi] and [The Force Awakens] period became more concrete, we would go and make sure we connected those dots and pulled the web together.”

Erickson also talked about the crucial hires for the game, including writer Alex Freed (formerly with BioWare) and others. “Combined, we’ve got a good decade-plus of hardcore EU experience,” Erickson said. “And on top of that, we’ve got a bunch of people that are a bunch of ex-LucasArts.”

“The experience as a whole is definitely noteworthy. We’ve got a lot of Star Wars experience,” said Erickson. “But it s different, too. Oh, my god, yes. Hugely, hugely,” Erikson said. “This is moving to the major leagues. Sitting down at the table, creating new canon, creating the next chapter of Star Wars is hugely different. The EU stuff is fantastic and really fun to do, but it s not the same thing”.

“Playing in history isn t the same thing as making history.”

The company has gone all out with promotion of the game, including a stop at PAX Prime, where it flew in Lando Calrissian himself, Billy Dee Williams, to discuss it with its many fans.

Star Wars: Uprising releases this Thursday for iOS and Android. Of course, the Force is strong with it.

One Thing You Can Bet Millennials Don’t Like: Being Called Millennials

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Even though millennials make up a vital part of today’s work force, they don’t automatically consider themselves millennials.

According to a report from People Press, a survey conducted by the Pew Research Center indicates that the millennial generation don’t recognize themselves as much. Only 40 percent of adults in the 18-34 age bracket consider themselves part of that generation, while 33 percent consider themselves more of the Generation X market. The rest, it seems falls in the Baby Boomer Market or the Silent Generation.

Some interesting bullet points from the report include:

 

  • 79 percent of those ages 51 to 69 consider themselves part of the Baby-Boomer generation. Among those in the 35 to 50 age bracket, only 58 percent of those consider themselves part of Generation X.
  • Only 18 percent of those between the ages of 70-87 (the Silent Generation) consider themselves part of said Generation. They prefer to think of themselves more as Baby Boomers (34 percent) or the Greatest Generation (also 34 percent).
  • In terms of recognizance of such groups, 89 percent of those surveyed stated they have heard of the Baby-Boom Generation. Meanwhile, only 71 percent have heard of Generation X.
  • 56 percent of those polled have heard of the Millennial generation (staggering considering the size of the group), but only 15 percent of all those surveyed (out of over 3,100 adults) have heard of the Silent Generation.
  • Members of the Silent Generation have considered themselves hard-working (83 percent), responsible (78 percent), patriotic (73 percent), self-reliant (65 percent), moral (64 percent), willing to sacrifice (61 percent) and compassionate (60 percent). As you can see from the chart below, those numbers vary greatly by generation.

 

  • Out of all these figures on the chart, only one factor — idealistic — shows a change in the groups, with millennials (39 percent) showing higher marks than Gen Xers (28 percent), Boomers (31 percent) and Silents (26 percent) in terms of describing themselves as such.
  • While millennials cover a large group in today’s market, only 40 percent of those polled consider themselves as such, while a third of those polled stated they belonged to the Gen X group. Older millennials are a bit different, with 43 percent stating they’re Gen Xers, and 35 percent identified themselves as millennials. Younger (18-26) had unique numbers as well, with 45 percent considering themselves part of this generation.
  • A lot of people born between 1965 and 1980 easily identify themselves as part of Gen X. Only 4 percent of those polled thought they were millennials, while 15 percent consider themselves Boomers. Younger Gen Xers (35 to 42) identified easily with that generation, by 68 percent. Meanwhile, only 48 percent see themselves as part of this current generation, while only 24 percent identify themselves as Boomers.

 

The full report can be found here.

Inside Scopely’s ‘Aggressive’ Marketing Campaign

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It takes a lot these days to burst into the top ranks of mobile games, and even more to stay there. You need a great game, of course, but great marketing is virtually a necessity to get a mobile game into the top ranks swiftly. The latest example is Scopely’s The Walking Dead: Road to Survival, which has seen over four million installs in its first week, and been at or near the top of the charts in both the iOS App Store and the Google Play Store. The game’s success has been propelled not only by the quality of the game and the tens of millions of fans of The Walking Dead, but by Scopely’s extensive marketing campaign.

Scopely designed a custom, multi-pronged marketing approach to mobilize The Walking Dead core fan base and elevate the brand to new audiences. The campaign kicked off with a two week pre-launch viral push designed to engage the core fans and turn them into brand advocates and early adopters, and amplified at launch with national broadcast advertising and partnerships with social media influencers such as YouTube sensation PewDiePie.

The Walking Dead: Road to Survival campaign highlights include:

  • 160 million impressions from national TV campaign for 30-second cinematic, full CGI TV spot targeting Men 18-49 on major networks, ESPN, ESPN2, Comedy Central, Adult Swim, FX, NFL Network, MTV, TBS and TNT
  • 56 million impressions across social platforms, Twitter, Instagram and Facebook
  • Four million views from promo videos on YouTube and Facebook with PewDiePie and other social influencers transformed into Walkers by The Walking Dead makeup artists
  • 20 million impressions from pre-launch viral campaign on Twitter, Instagram and web:
    • 6.2 million impressions from viral mailer leading to Choose Your Own Adventure-style clue hunt on Instagram
    • 56,400 calls made to a secret phone number, prompting returned, interactive calls from Walking Dead character Lori Grimes
    • Early adopter “Patient Zero” CRM campaign to drive Facebook connect adoption, and integrated in app, push and email CRM programming targeted by user
  • 10 language worldwide ad creative

Jamie Berger, head of product marketing for Scopely, spoke with [a]listdaily about the marketing campaign and what we can expect from the future of mobile game marketing.

Jamie Berger

How did you devise this marketing campaign, and what was the thinking that lead to this campaign?

The foundational part of the marketing campaign really goes back to the insights into the consumer. That informed the product as well as the marketing. I would argue one of the reasons we’ve been successful is that everything we have done is built on the understanding of both fans of The Walking Dead and fans of roleplaying games — and what it meant to make a Walking Dead roleplaying game on mobile that would excite and engage the fans. What were those components that were critical to the game experience but would also speak to the consumers from a marketing point of view It’s not all about the tactics — the tactics are interesting, but it has to start with a foundational understanding the consumers, the players, what their desires are, and making the game that’s going to engage and delight them. The marketing comes quite easily after that, because we have an amazing property, a terrific game that the players love, and combining those things creates a really powerful message.

What metrics have you achieved so far for the game?

It’s exciting to see the immediate response to the game. We anticipated that — we clearly understood the really powerful passion around The Walking Dead. We were #1 All Apps for four days in the App Store, we’re still the #2 game and #13 in All Apps, and that’s a a week later. On Google Play we’ve been rising up the charts, we’re now the #4 app of all free apps, and the #1 game in the Google Play store. That’s a testament to how strongly people are responding to this game. The marketing is really just there to activate that audience. It’s breaking through a very crowded market for entertainment as well as mobile apps. Once they heard about the game and they heard the word of mouth from their friends, that’s what really drive the virality and the instant growth.

Your marketing campaign covered many elements — TV ads, influencers, social media — which is not the norm for many games. Why did you go so wide with your strategy?

There are two answers for that. First, we really believed in the product, it’s been in development for quite some time, and we saw how outstanding it was and tapped into a lot of unmet needs for the consumer market, for Walking Dead fans and RPG players. Some of the scope of this campaign is testament to our belief in this game being an outstanding game that people would want to play, so it informed our willingness to be aggressive.

Secondly, we know that this market for mobile games and entertainment is extremely competitive with numerous outstanding brands in the market at any given time, and thus numerous options for a consumer or a player at any given time. So we definitely believe that the best strategy in this case was to go both broad and deep at launch. When I say broad and deep, we did take two vectors in our strategy. Starting with the superfans, engaging the most core Walking Dead fans through a viral social campaign. Our focus was to activate that audience, get their attention, get them talking, knowing something was coming pre-launch.

When we had their attention and told them there was a new game based on The Walking Dead, they immediately took action. They downloaded the game and used their megaphone to tell millions of others that the game was now available. That was our first and primary platform, to use the virality and the depth of engagement of that audience to activate them. Then at launch is when you started seeing the breadth campaign. Television, of course, which we’re using in the US right now. Then numerous digital platforms — Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, where we’re able to target and reach a global audience at mass scale. It’s mass in sheer volume of the people we were advertising to at any given time, but it was extremely targeted because we have multiple campaigns running right now digitally, individually targeted to a particular interest of a consumer.

How much is the marketing spend  for this campaign compared to typical mobile game campaigns, when will you know if this level of spending is paying off?

We’re not disclosing dollars on the campaign itself, but from the scale and cope it’s obviously an aggressive campaign. We’re putting a meaningful investment behind it, not just in the media but in the creative execution as well. Flying out makeup artists to make PewDiePie and other influencers into walkers from The Walking Dead. I wouldn’t even try to compare it to other campaigns out there — I just think it would be apples and oranges. What I would say is we’re extremely happy with how this early investment is paying off on multiple fronts — from brand awareness to brand recognition, to people are looking for us by name and talking about us through word of mouth, driving aided and unaided brand awareness. Our direct awareness is bringing in consumers who are extremely engaged, playing the game multiple times a day, and they’re loving the game — we’re getting really high net promoter scores from our players. On all fronts, it’s really worked as we hoped and desired.

Do you feel this sort of effort raises the marketing stakes for other mobile game companies?

The market is already requiring it as far as we’re concerned. The mobile game market is undergoing a rapid evolution. The level of sophistication on all fronts — the quality of the games, the consumer sophistication, the platform, the business, the technology, the marketing, all the table stakes are rising. I would argue we saw that coming and we believed it was important for us to lean in and execute at optimal capabilities and fire on all cylinders. It’s not about us trying to change the dynamics of the market globally, it’s just we see where the market is going and trying to break through in an increasingly competitive market with consumers who have effectively unlimited choices available to them at any given moment. Maybe it’s a harbinger of the future, but I wouldn’t claim we’re trying to raise the stakes ourselves.

Activision Launching New ‘Destiny’ Content Early

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Activision s Destiny has been making waves since its launch on the market last September, selling millions of copies across the board and involving players in a number of group-based events online, mainly put together by the developers at Bungie. Now, with the biggest expansion yet set to launch in just under two weeks, Activision is looking to revive the community even further by releasing some of its content a little bit earlier.

Forbes reports that a patch for the game will launch on September 8, and with it players will be able to get a taste of the latest expansion for the game, The Taken King. All the new Crucible maps from the expansion will be available to try out a week early, and a new weapon balance patch will be put in place, so that players can rebuff their highly leveled assault rifles and other weapons with ease.

In addition, The Tower Gunsmith will also be able to build weapons for players, which can be tested out in the field and pre-ordered when the expansion arrives a week later.

Other tweaks will be introduced with the game s new patch as well, including the debut of a new voice for the cybernetic assistant Ghost, with actor Nolan North replacing Peter Dinklage a move that has some fans grateful, considering his droll delivery.

This try before you buy system is an ideal way for Activision to get fans excited for the new expansion, which will be available as both part of Destiny s new physical game package and as a separate download for Xbox Live and PlayStation Network. It s set to sell separately for $39.99.

And this isn t the first time that Activision has offered a taste of a popular franchise before its release. Last month, it ran a beta for the multiplayer portion of its forthcoming sequel Call of Duty: Black Ops III, introducing players to new components of the game, while at the same time delivering the multiplayer experience that they ve come to expect. That game will release in November for $59.99.

The newest trailer for The Taken King can be found below.