While the franchise’s rapidly-record-breaking success has generated a love-hate relationship between gamers and Call of Duty no one can deny the impact each game has in the industry every fall. The pop-cultural acceptance and mainstreaming of Call of Duty owes much thanks to the marketing folks at Activision, especially in recent years with the smart use of live-action trailers to add buzz to each annualized release.
Call of Duty: Black Ops made waves when it featured the likes of Kobe Bryant and Jimmy Kimmel in a live-action TV ad, and its followup, Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 is continuing the tradition, this time throwing Hollywood A-lister Robert Downey Jr. into the cockpit of a jet fighter.
Highlighting the Call of Duty tagline “There’s a soldier in all of us,” the latest creative live-action venture (directed by Guy Ritchie) follows an everyday guy (with a fro and a mustache) nonchalantly calling in a tactical strike while being sniped, while the sniper has a tomahawk thrown at them, and so on and so forth. From there, the commercial goes tech-heavy, highlighting the future-setting of Black Ops 2.
There are drones, armored mechs, hovering jets and more. Watch the video up top, also featuring FPSRussia, who helped launch the marketing campaign for the title with a video on the Quadrotor.
In addition to the obvious Iron Man nod with the AC/DC music and the “gunfight” line, there’s even a little love for the zombies thrown in. For more COD zombies fun, check out the live-action trailer for zombie Rezurrection DLC for Black Ops 1. Zombies of course return again after first appearing in World at War, this time getting their own story campaign.
Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 releases November 13, 2012 for the PC, PS3, and Xbox 360, and November 18th for the Wii U. Iron Man 3 hits theaters on May 3, 2013.
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Follow Rob on Twitter @rob_keyes.
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That was a pretty cheap cameo, haha.
I’d say it was probably a very expensive one
Ha, true.
Thats an awesome Trailer. FPSRussia, awesome.
My only disappointment is the fact we dont have iron man suits in 2025
lol.
Thats was a good line from RDJ and they blew him up XD hahaha. That should have been the launch trailer cause 10x more epic than the real one.
The funny thing is, RDJ wouldn’t be able to bring a jet to a gun fight in the actual game.
Maybe it was a killstreak lol.
That was maybe kind of funny(3.5/10 on the meter) but stupid. . . . Kind of a waste of money spent in my opinion. It was random and I don’t know if they were trying to portray the game experiences in a live action. If so they failed, the MW3 live action “Vet vs Noob” did a better job.
Here is my idea on a better live action trailer that would promote live action:
Have a few people fight it out for a bit all dramatic/humors trash talk then randomly start putting zombies in there and have them team up and just show slow dramatic music or something and have them stat blowing zombies up with witty trash talk. But that is just my pilot on a better advert then this one. . . .
With so many live action trailers coming out the Black Ops 2 live action trailer just looks like rubbish in comparison to all the others out there.
So, am I the ONLY person that noticed the other celebrities in this? O.o
Ikr, I see people fighting over whether or not the sniper was Jack Black or not…I say it was
now i know why the CoD games cost so much when the games look like horse s*** – they use most the money to market the f*** out of the game to draw poor suckers in. where as the smart people (myself being one of them) look at garbage like this and laugh at all the suckers wasting money on this trashy franchise based on some half a**ed and trashy live action video featuring someone that probably hasn’t even played (everyone’s heard of it for sure) the games (RDJ).
i really hope halo 4 doesn’t screw up in terms of sales b/c of it’s close release date to this PoS, it would be a shame if something that had a lot of time and heart put into it got slaughtered by something that a college graduate could make
Who are you to judge someone for what they do for Entertainment? Oh you’re one of these “Smart People” who think this game’s garbage? Congratulations, you have an opinion! It certainly doesn’t make you more intelligent than any one who enjoys spending their time playing this game.
Basically, what you’re saying is, “Hey Everybody, I’m a much better person than you because I have a different preference of video games!”.
I feel bad for you.
So you carnt afford the game then, that’s what your trying to say
So you carnt afford the game then, that’s what your trying to say.
J”The Truth”Walka!
Great cameos from RDJ, iJustine, and FPSRussia. I thought it was funny, and I like how they changed up the ‘surprise’ them from one of Black Ops’ trailers. But did they really need to use “Back in Black” again after they already used it in the launch trailer?
My thoughts exactly on the music. Don’t get me wrong, I love AC/DC, I actually Own most of their CD library But the song was already used in a previous trailer..
My thoughts on the trailer? Cheese. Uber-Cheese, and I like cheese both literally and figuratively. Granted they have an absurd amount of money to throw around so its not much of a loss but they still could’ve done a better job at advertising, At least for the fans.
Activision’s marketing goal is just to get as many undecided or unaware sheep as possible to buy BO2. What better way to do that than with a live-action trailer filled with stars, action, and humor that isn’t representative of the game at all?
Halo is better than Call of Duty? Ha! It’s damn near the same exact thing in terms of gameplay.
Jwalka, you misunderstand me. I don’t care if someone has something negative to say about Call of Duty, it’s not my favorite game I just enjoy it for what it is, but I just can’t stand remarks that are just so arrogant. And you, sir, are the most guilty. Seriously, you say the same exact thing like you want sheep to jump from one herd to the next. Call of Duty is fun, but the best shooter? That’s debatable, and an endless debate I might add. Call of Duty is fun because it ISN’T hyper realistic. And seriously, playing by your rules, you’re a hypocrite and a contradiction; calling people sheep although you fit into the COD-troll-factory. Nobody is sheep lol I guarantee you people are buying it because they genuinely enjoy it, at least a little. I think you “haters” are just mad because your favorite game isn’t selling, or a game you’re interested in steals a page from Call of Duty, idk there’s tons of possibilities!
You’re like the bum standing out side telling people the apocalypse is coming. Shut up and let people enjoy their game. I’ll enjoy it more because come launch I’ll think to myself “jwalka died a little inside”. You act like Kotich did your mom and doesn’t even have the decency to buy you a Porsche, or your girlfriend (boyfriend) left you for COD.
I don’t like Borderlands, Resident Evil, Saint’s Row, etc., but you don’t see me crying about it. You got problems lol
My apologies if I was out of line. Will keep it civilized.
Yep, people who call others sheep or tools are those exact things themselves. They just don’t realize who’s using them. (for instance one of those people would respond to this: “Spoken like a true tool”. Boy haven’t you all been trained well.)
I don’t understand why people keep saying this trailer sucks. I thought it was hiliarious. I don’t think its a big marketing ad, but more of a comedic advert. I thought it was pretty interesting and funny seeing all does Celeb. Cameos. But people will have their opinions..
The Robert Downy JR. photo reminds me of the 1992 Sega CD game Sewer Shark. I having some serious flashbacks today lol.
love this page