Infinity Ward creative strategist Robert Bowling has responded to last week's Modern Warfare 3 mega leak on Twitter, saying that not all of the leaked information is correct.

"A lot of hype & a lot of leaked info on #MW3, some still accurate, some not. To avoid spoiling the experience, I'd wait for the real reveal," he said.

One part of the leak that's looking more and more certain is the release date. A Modern Warfare 3 poster, and retail sources have all but confirmed Tuesday November 8 as the big day. The poster features artwork identical to the Modern Warfare 3 box art leaked a couple of weeks ago, suggesting that that, too, is legitimate. You'll find the poster image below.

Bowling also pointed the way towards four Modern Warfare 3 teaser trailers, and advises fans to keep an eye on the new Modern Warfare 3 Facebook page for further updates. Here's that poster, courtesy of IGN.

At the end of last week, an enormous Modern Warfare 3 leak spilled a megaton of plot and character information onto the web. Activision have decided to roll with it and release four Modern Warfare 3 teaser trailers over the weekend. They show attacks on four major cities in England, America, Germany and France, and include a short message from the game's central villain.

Infinity Ward dev Robert Bowling broke the news of the trailers on Twitter, admitting that the leak had taken Infinity Ward by surprise.

"Wasn’t planned, but you’re clearly hyped, so here is the 1st of many Modern Warfare 3 videos coming in hot today!"

And here they are. Each one features the voice of Modern Warfare's big baddie, Makarov, speaking in Russian. VG247 translate the words as “One… will destroy the enemy’s hope for victory.” More is set to appear soon on the new Modern Warfare 3 Facebook page.

Kotaku has dropped a payload of leaked Call of Duty: Modern Warfare details covering everything from the locations and characters of the single player campaign to the precise number of maps in the multiplayer mode. Find out more about the characters you'll be playing as, the new vehicles you'll be driving and the new locations you'll be blowing up in the huge info blowout below. Spoilers ahead.

The single player campaign will be set across 15 missions. It will pick up where Modern Warfare 2 left off with the invasion of Manhattan by Russian forces. As with previous Modern Warfare titels the campaign will skip between many different locations across the world, and have you playing as a number of different characters, not all of whom will survive.

Locations include Manhattan, the catacombs of Paris, India and Dubai. YOu'll be playing as a Russian Federal Protective Services agent, an SAS Operative and a tank gunner. We can also look forward to the return of the AC-130 gunship from previous Modern Warfare titles. Kotaku have released VERY spoilery details of the single player campaign here.

The multiplayer mode will contain 20 maps, though it's not certain at the moment how many of these will be in the game on launch, and how many will be released as map packs after launch. The excellent co-op Spec Ops mode of Modern Warfare 2 will make a return as well, and will be split into "survival" and "mission" modes. Five survival maps and seven mission maps are listed, some of which may be cut or altered before release.

All of the information above comes via Kotaku, who say that they received the information through multiple sources. The game's due out on November 8 this year. The multiplayer maps and single player locations are all listed below some of the leaked first images of the game.











Multiplayer maps

Alpha
Alps
Bootleg
Bravo
Brooklyn
Carbon
Coast
Dome
Exchange
Hardhat
Interchange
Lambeth
Meteora
Mogadishu
Paris
Plaza 2
Radar
Seatown
Underground
Village

Spec Ops mode

Survival

Carbon
Dome
Radar
Seatown
Village

Mission

Civilian Rescue
Flood the Market
Invisible Threat
Little Bro's
Out of Africa
No Fly Zone
Wing Man

 
*SPOILERS* Single player campaign locations:

Dharmasala, India
New York, New York
A plane transporting the president of Russia
A town in Sierra Leone
London, England
Mogadishu, Somalia
Hamburg, Germany
Paris, France
Prague, Czech Republic
A castle in the Czech mountains
Berlin, Germany
The Kremlin in Moscow, Russia
Dubai, United Arab Emirates
Washington. D.C.

During the ongoing Activision/Blizzard investor call, Activision announced that they were developing a Call of Duty Online micro-transaction focused game for Asia. They also noted that details of the next Western focused Call of Duty game would be 'shared in the coming weeks'. To the shareholders, they also talked of 'a combined marketing campaign that will the largest we've ever executed.'

There was also mention of GAAP profits. Activision are making a lot of money.

EA is already preparing for the showdown between Battlefield 3 and the Call of Duty game that hasn't even been announced yet. CEO John Riccitiello predicts that EA and Activision will easily spend more than $100 million each on marketing when both games are released later this year, and admits that Battlefield 3 is targeted at taking the shooter top spot from the Call of Duty series.



Speaking at the Ad Age conference, covered by Gamasutra, Riccitiello said that we can expect EA and Activision "a couple hundred million dollars marketing against these two products."

Riccitiello observes that the game industry has an audience of 1.5 billion players worldwide, and predicts that this could grow to 3 billion people in the next three or four years, dwarfing television audiences, and opening up more opportunities for advertising companies to run huge marketing campaigns.

The ads won't just extend to billboards and TV spots. EA already run advertising in multiplayer lobbies. Barack Obama ran ads in EA games ahead of the presidential election, and Riccitiello says we can expect more of the same as Battlefield 3 gets ready to take on Call of Duty in the coming months. "Today's consumer is very much expecting advertising," he says "we didn't have that understanding a few years ago."

One thing's for sure. As we get closer to Battlefielsd' release in November, it'll be hard to get away from the $100 million marketing campaigns EA and Activision will be running. For more on Battlefield 3, check out the latest Battlefield 3 trailer.

Modern Warfare: Frozen Crossing is a series of top class, fan made Call of Duty videos from the team behind the brilliant Minecraft film, The Last Minecart. The video above is part 3 of the saga. You'll find parts one and two embedded below.

The first film hit the web last summer, giving us a a portion of blockbuster Call of Duty action with top level production values. You'd never know from looking at it, but the film only cost $209 to make. The second video was even better, and showed off the team's talents for shooting believable action scenes on a tiny budget. That film cost just $600 to make. Watch both parts below.

Graham's question to the office: "Is it just incredibly easy to make amazing special effects now?" We are trying to figure out how the this self-funded live action tribute to the Modern Warfare games can look quite this good. Toronto-based We Can Pretend Productions have recreated key scenes from the plots of the first two Modern Warfare games with creepy accuracy, and in this trailer they show a glimpse of where they're taking it next.

It was bizarre and irritating that Modern Warfare 2's single player story ended without you bringing Makarov, responsible for that infamous airport massacre, to grisly justice. That countdown turned out not to be Modern Warfare 3, but it looks like it'll advance the story of the series anyway. I hope Activision don't shut it down first.

Last week Activision canned their long running Guitar Hero series on consoles. Releasing a new version of the game every year had worn customers out, and it was decided that nobody would want yet another entry in the series. With Activision committed to releasing a new Call of Duty game every year, could the same thing happen to the shooter series?

That was the question Industry Gamers asked a series of industry analysts, who concluded that Call of Duty is unlikely to be milked to death in the same way that Guitar Hero was, though the risk is there. DFC Intelligence analyst David Cole says "there is a very real danger of milking a franchise and causing quality to decline, which can result in turning consumers off. With COD I think the danger is trying to maintain the quality of the franchise and making sure they don't release product just to release product."

Another analyst cited Call of Duty's multiplayer community as the source of its staying power, saying that Call of Duty "has a vibrant online community that keeps growing. When a new version comes out, the 'network effect' kicks in, and many people buy it because their friends have done so. The risk to the franchise is competition, not people tiring of the gameplay... CoD won't fade unless Activision opens the door to competition by making a bad game."

There's no shortage of competition. DICE are standing in the sidelines ready to take the crown. This year will likely see Battlefield 3 go head to head with the next Call of Duty game. What do you think, could yearly releases burn out the Call of Duty series?