Call of Duty Launches New Campaign for Latest Black Ops Game

May. 28, 2024

Call of Duty, one of the most successful first-person action franchises, is back to wake up the world to the stakes of the newest Black Ops game. Sparking the public's consciousness with a provocative, creative and multi-layered execution that reveals the deep realities of the 90s – the franchise is ready to debut "The Truth Lies."

This new campaign, developed and created in partnership with creative agency 72andSunny has been designed to reveal the game’s name and key art to the world, for the first time ever. 

Everyone remembers the 90s as a time of glitz and glamor, bright lights and pop music. But in the world of Black Ops, the reality is that while those things were going on, there was a secret war being waged behind the scenes, in the darkness, to keep the peace. The game and campaign dive into the trenches of this secret war.

To wake up the world to the stakes of the new Black Ops game, COD and 72andSunny started to tease the game last week by questioning the validity of the truth and where it comes from. Dubbed “The Truth Lies in Plain Sight,” the teasers placed provocative messages on institutions/symbols of political leadership, power, media and law to build the sinister world of the Black Ops game in 1991. The teasers targeted the institutions you thought were the TRUTH, those meant to protect you and keep you safe, but were keeping you in the dark, giving you rose colored glasses as they waged a secret war.

The first teaser included a video of a stunt where Mt. Rushmore is being blindfolded with the message, “The Truth Lies” with accompanying paid newspaper articles in the NY Post and USA Today that also showed the stunt.

COD also tapped artist and activist Shepard Fairey’s Studio Number One – you may recognize him as the founder of OBEY and the designer behind Obama’s HOPE poster. Fairey's team at SNO developed a one of a kind poster that brings the line “THE TRUTH LIES” to life. The posters were placed across NYC, LA and Mexico City, as well as handed out to influencers. This went live in tandem with the Mt. Rushmore video to reinforce “THE TRUTH LIES” message around the world.

Another stunt happened at the same time in NYC last week. A branded news van drove around to the biggest names in media/news in NYC, think FOX, GMA, NBC ABC, etc with the message, “This Truth is The First Casualty of War,” “The Truth Lies,” “In Lies We Trust” and “Protect Yourself Against Weapons of Mass Deception.”

The campaign was supported across social media, as well as in cryptic ways across the web, by ATVI in partnership with their digital agency partners at Mutiny / Trailer Park. The Mt. Rushmore film launched first on a mysterious website, TheTruthLies.com as one central interactive digital hub where fans could discover all the assets and engage with them on an old 90s TV. This included the ability to download the assets themselves so that fans could repost and share them on their social channels. 

The second wave of the campaign came today, May 28th with the launch of the hero spot, “The Truth Lies in the Dark,” and reveals the new game’s official key art and box art. Through the use of prosthetic artists, likeness and voice casting, the new film features famous politicians and military leaders Saddam Hussein, Bill Clinton, Margaret Thatcher, George H Bush and Colin Powell as their 1991 selves to deliver a chilling message; challenging the public and having them question their reality and everything they knew to be true. By tapping into these controversial figures, the film grounds the game immediately in a state of realism tied to events that happened in 1991.

The campaign is running globally, including in US, UK, FR, Germany, Spain, Italy, Saudi Arabia, Japan, Australia, LATAM markets, generating buzz among fans before the worldwide gameplay reveal trailer debuts on the Xbox showcase stage June 9th.