Square Enix Celebrates 20 Years Of ‘Tomb Raider’ At E3

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Tomb Raider, featuring the most iconic female video game character of all time, Lara Croft, is celebrating her 20th birthday—and Square Enix is inviting the entire fan base to join in.

A majority of the festivities will take place during this year’s Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3), but Square Enix and Crystal Dynamics are including those outside the expo floor through social media and a number of contests. At this year’s E3, a special episode of Square Enix Presents (the publisher’s live broadcast from the show floor) will highlight fan-favorite tombs from the past two decades of Lara’s adventures. While visiting the booth, show attendees can receive a limited edition, custom-engraved medallion with the 20-year celebration logo.

Meanwhile, outside the expo, Square Enix is engaging fans globally with the question, “What does Tomb Raider mean to you?” Fans are invited to submit a video explaining how the franchise has influenced or inspired them, as well as their favorite memories from the games or movies. For the fan art community, an art contest is underway through June 17. Winners will each receive $1,000 and will have their works featured in a special print art offering to be revealed later this year.

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During this year’s PAX East, Square Enix hosted a panel entitled, “Lara Croft: The Undisputed Queen of Gaming,” which included a number of announcements and a cosplay contest. Other announcements celebrating Tomb Raider‘s 20th anniversary include how the original franchise composer, Nathan McCree, is creating a musical collection entitled, The Tomb Raider Suite. Available this fall, the collection will include all classic compositions, as well as extensions and variations of original tracks from the first three Tomb Raider games. A TV documentary called Tomb Raider: Remastered will give fans a behind-the-scenes look at the entire composition process, and the album will be accompanied by a live concert in London, which corresponds with the official 20th anniversary date (November 14) of the original 1996 release of the game. Further details about the concert will be revealed at a later date.

In a marketing strategy that includes fans of both the classic and reboot versions of Lara Croft, Square Enix is not only honoring their tomb-raiding icon but her audience as well. This all-inclusive strategy, using the hashtag #TombRaider20 on social media, celebrates all those jumping, flipping and shooting memories that made Lara Croft an unforgettable character. By connecting with their audience on an emotional level, Square Enix utilizes Frontline Marketing to engage them on a level that is both authentic and consumer-first.

Apple’s App Store Will Soon Get Search Ads

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App developers for Apple’s devices are about to get a major boost in exposure, thanks to a new search ads program.

Apple confirmed the debut of these new ads yesterday, set to release this fall on the App Store. With that, both developers and companies will have a way to promote their apps in a non-intrusive manner, so that interested consumers can check them out and quickly download them to their device of choice.

The ads will appear on the top of the main app store page, with a number of targeting features to help users find similar apps to the ones they’re looking for. These will be done through names and keywords, setting up the ideal advertising slot for a developer to promote a specific app.

However, the program will be careful when it comes to recommendations, and will avoid suggesting an app that a user may already have on their device. Apple will also use both demographic and location-based data to suggest local companies when relevant. Relevance will play a big part, so users don’t get flooded with apps they’ll never use, according to the company. Their user tracking won’t be used for recommendations either, as no data will be taken from other apps.

“Over 65 percent of downloads come directly from searches on the App Store,” the report noted, indicating that various targeting features will play a part when it comes to specific application suggestions.

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Better still, advertisers will only need to pay if a user taps their ad. There’s also an auction system in place to assure that market pricing doesn’t go through the roof. Apple will also make sure that Search Ads are based on certain demographics, such as specific keyword selection, audience targeting and APIs based across management, reporting and campaign creation.

All taken together, this could be quite a useful tool for both Apple and its advertisers when it launches this fall.

SuperData: MMO And MOBA Game Market To Reach Nearly $20 Billion

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The MMO/MOBA gaming market is massive right now, thanks to the immense popularity of games like DOTA 2 and League of Legends, which continuously bring in millions of players daily. According to SuperData, revenues are actually a lot bigger than some people might think.

The company’s latest report, The MMO and MOBA Games Market 2016, details how the worldwide revenue for the market is expected to jump over 13 percent for this year. As a result, that will put it at nearly $20 billion overall, mainly driven by increases in both MOBA (Multiplayer Online Battle Arena) games and collectible card titles (like Hearthstone).

SuperData also reports that free-to-play games are heavily popular in this market, with six of the top-ten grossing games utilizing this format. All together, they make up 86 percent of total revenue for MMO (Massively Multiplayer Online) games.

League of Legends is a defining leader in the report, making $150 million monthly with nearly 100 million players worldwide, with a majority of players in the Asian market.

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“Generally, more than a third of MMO gamers play a title for more than one-and-a-half years before quitting, so maximizing revenue from experienced players is critical,” says Joost van Dreunen, CEO for SuperData. “Keeping the player engaged with new content, daily challenges and the ability to manipulate the in-game environment will decrease their likelihood to abandon the game for another title.”

While returning players have a big part in the market, so do new players, as 84 percent of those playing within thee first month are likely to make some form of purchase, including boosts and in-game currency. Expansion packs also do fairly well, but mainly with those that check out what the game’s content has to offer first.

Players keep coming back to familiar titles like League of Legends, and the report notes that they play an average of five sessions a week, each lasting about 1.9 hours.

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There are those that leave the market, and they tend to do so as groups, with 34 percent noting they leave a title behind mainly because “friends stop playing.” Approximately 81 percent enjoy playing with others they know, and 58 percent follow their friends and family over to a new title they’re introduced to.

As for MMO games in general, their future appears to rest in the free-to-play sector. “By the end of the year, free-to-play gamers will make up 93 percent of all MMO players,” said van Dreunen. “We have seen many subscription-based MMOs shifting to the free-to-play model, especially those that already had in-game purchasing opportunities.”

‘Mafia III’ Is Bringing New Orleans To E3

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Last month, 2K Games revealed new details about the third chapter in its open world organized crime series. Mafia III, received a good amount of social media attention when its announcement trailer revealed that the game would take place in New Orleans, and now the publisher is looking to build on that success going into the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) next week.

Before the show starts, 2K will team up with IGN to provide a world premiere look at Mafia III, including exclusive interviews, gameplay and a new trailer. The broadcast is set to take place on Sunday, June 12, at 5:30 PM PDT, and is available for viewing on IGN’s main page and apps.

Then 2K plans to recreate the city of New Orleans experience at its E3 booth. The company is offering plenty of fun New Orleans-inspired activities, including a retro-themed photo booth, a broadcast of 1960s TV programs (the era when the game takes place), live soul music on select days of the show, and tarot card and palm readings.

In addition, the publisher will host a food truck, where attendees who tweet #Mafia3 to the official Mafia Twitter account will be treated to a free lunch, consisting of New Orleans favorites like jambalaya and alligator tenders. The company will also host a themed funeral procession, inspired by traditional ones from The Big Easy, throughout the course of the three-day show.

2K has already released a new teaser trailer, giving fans a taste of what the game has to offer. Mafia III features an open world for players to explore using vintage cars, while occasionally engaging in fiery gunfights along the way.

The special Collector’s Edition of Mafia III is expected to be showcased at E3, which includes a special art book, Steelbook case, promotional flyers and two vinyl albums, containing both iconic songs from the ’60s and the game’s original score.

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Mafia III should have no problem making a killing — so to speak — when it releases for Xbox One, PlayStation 4 and PC on October 7.

Forge Founder Explains Role Of Game Video Sharing Platform

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Forge is a new short-form gameplay video platform that allows gamers to share favorite moments with friends across the Forge network, Twitch, or YouTube. The company has drawn the attention of both gamers and venture capitalists, having just added another $4.5 million in funding led by True Ventures, and including Social Capital, Resolute Ventures, and WME Ventures. That brings the total amount raised to $9 million.

Forge CEO Jared Kim launched his first company, WeGame, in 2007 at age 19. He raised $3 million in venture capital and sold the social discovery platform to Tagged in 2011. He returned to the game space in February 2016 to continue exploring the games industry. [a]listdaily talked to Kim about his new company, the role it plays in social media, and how eSports figures into the equation.

How does Forge work?

Forge is both a PC desktop client and a web application. To share gameplay, you simply install Forge and launch a game. We seamlessly capture everything you do in-game as video. There is no setup required, settings to tweak, or noticeable gameplay performance impact. We make everything as seamless as possible by auto-detecting the optimal settings for a gamer’s machine.

Gamers can share highlights instantly by using our in-game overlay or after they are done playing. Forge highlights are limited to 5 to 30 seconds, which we’ve found is the sweet spot for the simplest experience of sharing and consumption for this kind of content.

Forge highlights are automatically shared to your Forge profile and viewable at forge.gg. Additionally, you can share your highlights to external networks like Twitter.

In April, we also launched the ability to stream your gameplay to Twitch and YouTube Gaming in seconds. While you are streaming, you can still create and share highlights just like before.

What’s the business model for the service?

Right now, we’re very focused on creating the best experience around sharing gameplay. We have some exciting ideas around monetization, but ultimately our highest priority is developing a great community and marrying that with a monetization model that fits best with it when the time is right. Forge only launched publicly a little over three months ago, so we feel it’s a little premature to try to force a monetization model on it right now. One thing I can say with certainty is you won’t see traditional banner ads or video pre-rolls / post-rolls you typically see on gaming video sites today.

What does Forge open up for brands and sponsors interested in PC gamers?

We’ve had some discussions with developers, publishers, brands, and sponsors since we’ve launched. Forge enables more people to capture and share their gameplay, which creates interesting community engagement opportunities that didn’t exist before.

We don’t have anything to share right now but there are some interesting partnerships we will be announcing in the future. However, as mentioned previously, we are not going down the path of just throwing ads on everything. We’re really focused on helping power authentic experiences for and by gamers.

How do you see Forge fitting in the current ecosystem dominated by Twitch, Facebook and YouTube?

We like to think of Forge as the next evolution of the “gamer’s camera.” If you look at the evolution of traditional cameras for instance (e.g. film to digital to camera phones), each time a major technological shift happens and friction is reduced, you see a huge wave of new creators enter the ecosystem who previously didn’t create and share due to the prior complexity involved with it.

By making sharing gameplay easier than it ever was before, we believe we can help empower and unlock the next wave of gaming creators, which is not only great for Forge, but everyone in the ecosystem.

What differentiates Forge from anything else out there?

It boils down to simplicity and ease of use. We’ve turned a process that would have taken a normal user hours or days of setup to get right when using a tool like OBS (the most popular open-source tool for game capture and streaming) and reduced it down to seconds. Forge is able to do this by automating a lot of the setup and configuration by using algorithms to determine the optimal capture quality, resolutions, bitrates, closest servers, etc.

A good example is our livestreaming integration with Twitch and YouTube Gaming. You can take a look at the setup guide for getting started on Twitch with OBS and you will see what most people have to deal with. With Forge, it is literally seconds and a few clicks.

Who’s using Forge from a demographic standpoint?

Almost 40 percent of our users are from the US and more than 60 percent of our users are from English-speaking countries. Our users are mostly male in the 18-34-year-old age group.

What type of engagement are you getting from these users?

We focus a lot on how often our users create and share highlights, which is what we view as a sign of true engagement. Today our users are creating one highlight per 80 minutes of gameplay, which is an improvement from our private beta phase, where it was around one highlight per 200 minutes of gameplay. Our introduction of in-game highlighting was a big factor in that improvement.

What role do eSports games play for Forge and its users?

Competitive games like the ones found in eSports typically have a high number of “shareable moments” (e.g. kills, goals, etc). Almost every game in the top 10 games on Forge is a major game in the eSports ecosystem and as that market grows, so will the opportunity for Forge.

How will you be using the recent funding?

Our top priority is bringing the best engineering and product talent into the company, and this new funding helps us accelerate that.

What are you applying from lessons learned from previous startups to Forge?

I started my last startup WeGame when I was 19 and now I’m 28. My biggest lessons are:

  1. A great team means everything.
  2. Always make sure everyone in the company understands and is aligned with the vision and strategy.
  3. Stay focused.

[a]listdaily Weekly: Brands Try #Adulting + Snapchat Filters To Reach Youths

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This time on [a]listdaily weekly, we explore the joys of invisible talk, trolling Presidential candidates, raising an eyebrow at view statistics and encouraging millennials to color.

The voices in our head(phones) 

Podcasts are all the rage, ushering in a new breed: the branded podcast. Wells Fargo hosts a weekly economics-focused podcast and GE’s podcast, The Message, has been well-received. Set in the Halo universe, the podcast series HUNT the TRUTH turned everything fans knew about the video game franchise upside down in a fictional investigative audio series.

Overall, according to estimates from Edison Research, last year, 46 million Americans (or 17% of the population older than 12) listened to at least one podcast each month. That’s up from just 9 percent in 2008 and when have 46 million Americans ever been wrong? (Wait, don’t answer that.)

FOX (and politicians) get “Snappy”

Snapchat filters have officially entered the social lexicon—and the American political arena. A couple weeks ago, Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton used the platform to troll Donald Trump at the Republican nominee’s own rally in Anaheim. From Empire to XMen: Apocalypse, Snapchat filter takeovers have been a huge win for FOX and 20th Century FOX.

With sponsored filters reportedly worth $750,000 apiece for holidays and weekday filters estimated at half a million dollars each, Snapchat is enjoying an updated valuation of $17 billion.

What is “view?” Baby, don’t count me, don’t count me, no more…

How do you measure the success of a video? With all the attention and dollars heading into digital video, this may surprise you, but no one actually knows. You may have thought: well, a view is a view, right? Hahahaha no.

YouTube, for the admirable reason of preventing users from gaming their system, has notoriously been not-super-transparent about what is calculated as a view. Facebook, which is a relative newcomer to the video fray, has been able to boast getting over 8 billion daily video views. But Facebook takes a lax approach compared to YouTube’s undercover methodology—a view on Facebook is counted at 3 seconds. That’s it. (Also consider reports that 85% of video is watched without sound, implying that autoplay might be afoot.)

Brands Try #Adulting

Brands have officially caught wind of the word “adulting,” looking to relate to millennials who are going through the motions of adulthood, but continue to embrace their inner child.

In Spring of this year, fashionable work boot brand Timberland ran a 4-page coloring book ad in Marie Claire.

While some attempts at #Adulting have proved successful, other millennials look at them and proclaim, “Bye, Felicia!”

How Brands Can Make The Most Out Of Snapchat’s Redesign

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Snapchat’s popularity has grown significantly over the past few years, and it’s even getting to the point where the app sees more daily usage than Twitter. Its “Stories” section in particular has seen quite a bit of traction, and its latest redesign could help brands make the most out of attracting this large user base.

The company’s latest redesign will help companies put together content that posts directly onto the app, using a number of tools to help attract would-be subscribers, according to the Wall Street Journal, which is one of the 20 publishers ready to use the new feature.

Other publishers, including BuzzFeed, Vice and Cosmopolitan, are already taking part in the program, with images and headlines being put into play to lure in potential fans. There’s also an option to subscribe to these channels, which would put stories from companies into the same area where they get updates from friends.

This content will blend in alongside the “Live Stories” section, as well as the “Discover” section, giving them plenty of opportunity to be found by the millions of daily Snapchat users.

This appears to be part of Snapchat’s process to integrate advertising business into its app, so that users will view more content from its partners. It’s a move that’s likely to make publishers very happy, with the opportunity for better business promotion. Considering how Snapchat’s net worth right now sits at $16 billion (with $500 million raised from investors), it’s a move that will not only appeal to current partners, but also one that could bring in new ones.

With a number of devoted teams (namely at IGN and Snapchat) hard at work on Snapchat content, this could be a move for the better. “With the product change, it takes things to the next level in really allowing us to showcase a little bit of a teaser of the look and feel of what’s to come in that edition,” Oren Katzeff, head of programming at Tastemade, speaking with AdWeek.

“Everything [up until now] has been behind a wall—you have to press the logo to then get taken to the experience,” he said. “What’s exciting about the redesign is that it allows you to take some of the content that’s performed well and showcase it more.”

The redesign is live now, so users can see just how well this content blends in, and how attractive the headlines and images come across.

Gaming Discovery And Social Platform Player.me Goes Mobile

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Player.me is looking to connect players, streamers and developers with each other to socialize, discover new content, and show off their favorite games. The social site launched last year with little promotional support, and the community has already grown to include 100,000 members. Now it’s ready to take things even further with today’s launch of the Player.me mobile app, which allows users to share and collaborate while on the go.

[a]listdaily talks to Sean Fee, co-founder and CEO of Player.me, about how the discovery platform will grow to bring gaming enthusiasts together everywhere.

What is Player.me?

Player.me is a social discovery platform for the gaming community. It lets players discover, share, and collaborate with each other, groups, developers, and even popular streamers.

Where would you say Player.me fits in among social media channels such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram?

We are super focused on games, players, and the gaming community. Where other social media platforms revolve around connecting you to your existing network, we try to focus more discovery or connecting you to the people and games you should know, because your interests are so closely aligned. At the same time, Player.me connects to all of your existing social networks, like Facebook, Twitter and Steam so we also integrate all your gaming friends from multiple platforms into one gaming hub.

How does Player.me connect content creators with potential viewers?

We do it in a few ways; our feed pulls in content updates from YouTube, Twitch, Hitbox and Beam so that your fans know when you’re streaming or a new video has just released. We also have a tab in our feed dedicated to who’s streaming now and we show you streamers that may be of interest to you based off your profile. Creators can also add their video content to game pages to get discovered by fans of a particular game. Finally, by connecting your YouTube account to your profile we automatically pull in all your videos and display them on your profile and if you’re connected to Twitch or other streaming services your stream displays front and centre on your profile when you’re live.

How do the new mobile apps enhance the Player.me experience?

Mobile is obviously a key cornerstone of any social product these days, and whilst a lot of products go mobile first, we decided to really develop the product feature set through the web app and then work to bring all of those features into our mobile apps. I think what we’ve achieved is an incredibly rounded and feature-rich mobile experience that allows players to discover, share and collaborate with other players around the world on the go. It really is the most advanced mobile social platform for the gaming industry out there.

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What plans do you have to further grow the Player.me community?

We’ve been very pleased with the growth of Player.me, which has a community of nearly 100,000 gamers since we launched in mid-2015. But there are big plans ahead for the platform as well. To date, our growth has been purely word-of-mouth and we haven’t really invested any money in marketing because we felt mobile would be a very important factor. So we plan to work on some fun marketing strategies to supercharge our growth from this point on. We aren’t ready to discuss what’s next from Player.me just yet, but please stay tuned!

What would you say is the best reason for gamers to start using Player.me right now?

With the rapid rise of platforms like Steam, Twitch, YouTube, and more, the gaming community is somewhat fractured when it comes to social interaction and networking. One player may have a group of co-op friends on Steam, social friends on Twitter and Facebook, creators and streamers they enjoy on YouTube and Twitch, but these different networks can be disconnected and don’t always overlap.

Player.me and the new mobile app help bring all of this together into a central hub. We also feel that discovery in gaming is somewhat broken and that it’s hard for players or games to be discovered unless they’re featured on the big platforms. With Player.me, we plan to make discovery seamless and really enhance a players gaming experiences by introducing them to the right people, teams or games at the right time.

Candidate Crunch Is The New Mobile Game That Is Rocking The Vote

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Just because Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump have locked up their presidential nominations doesn’t mean mobile gamers can’t have some fun with the 2016 presidential election. The new Urthworx game, Candidate Crunch, lets players save (or not) candidates Bernie Sanders, Trump and Clinton. But there’s a lot more going on with this title, which is the brainchild of former entertainment lawyer Michael Fox. Fox explains why mobile gaming is ripe for raising money and awareness for causes and charities in this exclusive interview.

Candidate Crunch

Why did you decide to leave the world of entertainment law?

I actually never wanted to be in it!  I went to law school to be a human rights lawyer, but when I discovered that the law often has little to do with humans (much less their rights), I realized law was not the career for me. I started writing screenplays (often in lieu of going to class) and knew that storytelling was the path I wanted to pursue. But I stuck it out and graduated. Then, during my first year as an entertainment lawyer, I had a fateful encounter with a homeless man that changed my life. That led me to start a nonprofit where I produced an innovative benefit event for the homeless headlined by Kanye West and Common. That was my first foray into what we call “impact entertainment”—the fusion of entertainment and social impact.

What opportunities has mobile gaming opened up for raising awareness and money for good causes?

The former head of public policy at Facebook (Adam Conner) said “Gaming is the single-most underutilized tool for advancing the common good.” We very much believe that to be the case. We’re still figuring out the best ways to do it, but our first app NBA Escape (which is still in soft launch) raises awareness about fitness and nutrition through a trivia feature and, when players hit certain milestones, donations get triggered. Urthworx commits to donating 10 percent of its revenues to various causes.

Why did you decide to focus on voting and the election?

We had been working on a game called Celebrity Crush, where crazy things fell from the sky and you have to save the celebrities and raise money for their favorite causes. When we saw what was happening in the election and how high the stakes are for the future of the country, we transformed the game into Candidate Crunch. This is really an experiment to see if you can use a mobile game to drive participation in the election. So far, we’re seeing pretty high engagement in the civic elements of the app. Out of the first 85,000 downloads, more than 5,000 people have accessed the voter registration tools.

Who did you work with to develop this game and how involved were you with the creative process?

The game was built entirely in-house. We have a fantastic team who came from Gameloft, one of the top game developers in the world. Previously, our guys were the core team on Spider-Man Unlimited and The Oregon Trail. I’m the producer/creative director and am involved in developing all areas of the game.

How does Candidate Crunch encourage people to vote?

The app has a feature called Election Central, which is powered by Rock the Vote. It has everything you need for the election (online voter registration, a polling place locator, deadline reminders and more). Throughout the game, there are fun trivia sequences featuring interesting election-related facts and quotes from great American leaders along with cool and informative, shareable graphics.

Candidate Crunch

What are the challenges of getting a game like Candidate Crunch out into the world with such a crowded mobile market?

Where do we start?!? It’s a very competitive landscape. Right now there are a ton of “do terrible things to Donald Trump” games. Because Urthworx is focused on “impact entertainment” it has enabled us to secure great partners like the NBA (for our previous project NBA Escape) and Rock the Vote and DoSomething.org for Candidate Crunch. Having partners like that can help break through the clutter from both a promotional and reputational standpoint.

How has the non-stop election coverage helped your game?

We just released on June 2nd, so we have to wait and see about the effect.

Why is this election year especially important for people to get out and vote?

I think it’s important that people vote in every election. Personally, I would love it if voting were mandatory as it is in 32 other countries. As a country and a planet, we are at a crossroads and the Democrats and Republicans have some important distinctions with respect to some important issues.

What have you learned from previous digital endeavors like Baracky and The Empire Strikes Barack that you applied to this latest project?

Our motto is “pop culture with a purpose.” Back in ’08, when I created those viral videos for Obama, we were able to reach people who weren’t traditionally involved in the political process by conveying important information by re-mixing iconic movies like Rocky and The Empire Strikes Back. Using entertainment for social impact, when done correctly, can be very powerful.

What has the early reaction been to your game and who’s playing it?

So far the reaction has been largely positive with the vast majority of our ratings being five-stars.  However, we do get a bunch of one-stars because so-and-so hates Trump or Hillary (which doesn’t have much to do with the game). The comments in the app stores run the gamut from political rants to people who really like the civic engagement elements to people who just think it’s a fun silly game.

As for demographics, we aren’t able to get information about all users from the app stores, but from the information we do have, more than half are under 35 with the majority being between 19 and 25. The gender split is 75/25 (male/female).

Given your experience with this project, how open are you to exploring mobile games in the future for your causes?

Urthworx is committed to using mobile entertainment as a medium for social impact. Casual games can be a difficult market and you’re constantly having to build a new audience with each new game. Going forward, we are primarily focused on developing an interactive storytelling system that will allow us to deliver engaging entertainment on an on-going basis—think an interactive TV show.

 

Activision Bringing Back ‘Call Of Duty XP’ Community Event

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It has been five years, but Activision is bringing back the Call of Duty XP event in a big way, and it’s just in time to promote Infinite Warfare and the Call of Duty: World League.

The publisher has announced that it will bring back the popular fan event, which was last held in 2011. Call of Duty XP will take place from September 2-4 in Los Angeles, where fans can partake in a number of Infinite Warfare activities, including trying out the multiplayer features for the first time. But a huge focus of the event will be on the final round of the Call of Duty: World League eSports tournament, in which the best players from around the world will compete for more than $2 million in prizes.

In addition to going hands-on with Infinite Warfare and Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare Remastered, fans can also take part in other themed experiences, including Zombie Laser Tag, Nuketown paintball (featuring one of the most popular maps in the series, recreated as an actual arena), a yet to be announced “surprise musical guest” (2011 had Kanye West), and a number of panels featuring Call of Duty developers, including Infinite Warfare’s team at Infinity Ward.

“Call of Duty XP is going to be the biggest Call of Duty fan celebration in history,” said Eric Hirshberg, CEO of Activision Publishing. “The best Call of Duty players in the world will be front and center trying to win the first Call of Duty World League Championship at what is sure to be our biggest eSports event ever. Plus, fans will be able to see and play more hands-on content and reveals in one place than we’ve ever had, from Infinite Warfare, to Modern Warfare Remastered to Black Ops III DLC. Plus, there will be an off-the-charts list of Call of Duty inspired activities that you can’t experience anywhere else.”

Sony Interactive Entertainment America, Activision’s partner with the World League, will also be playing a big part in the event. It will help host a PlayStation VR experience, in which players can climb into the Jackal, a flying vehicle featured in Infinite Warfare.

“As a presenting partner of the Call of Duty World League, it’s been exciting to watch these talented teams compete and we’re looking forward to the culmination of the tournament during the Call of Duty Championship. We’re also thrilled to be bringing PlayStation VR to the amazing lineup of event activities, where fans will experience the thrill of piloting their own Jackal fighter jet,” said Adam Boyes, VP of Publisher Relations, Sony Interactive Entertainment America. “We’re proud to partner with Activision and Call of Duty on the return of this historic fan celebration and this can’t miss Call of Duty community gathering.”

Tickets for the event will go on sale this Saturday, ranging from $49 to $199, with a number of goodies—including a copy of Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare (and Modern Warfare Remastered)—available at the higher tiers.

Activision will also broadcast select events from the show, as well as the final rounds of the World League, through both its Twitch and YouTube channels over the course of the weekend.