Activision’s latest entry in the Call of Duty franchise, Modern Warfare 2, has sold over $1 Billion worldwide, quickly making it one of the most successful video game launches of all time, and putting it in the ranks of most successful entertainment products of all time.

“In its first five days alone, the game sold an estimated $550 million worldwide, outpacing five-day worldwide theatrical box office gross figures for such films as Avatar, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince and The Dark Night,” Activision crows.

ArsTechnica taks a look at the release process to see what we can learn from it.  Covering the usually high price, $60 rather than $50, the exclusion of PC gaming support and dedicated servers, and the unusual review policies Activision implemented.

There was only one way to review Modern Warfare 2: on the Xbox 360, in Santa Barbara, under the watchful eye of Activision. Accepting the paid trip, along with room and board, was the only way you were going to get a review before launch. Joystiq noted that this broke their ethics policy, but they went anyway. Who can say no to a review destined to bring in traffic?

In short it seems that to a point, the gaming industry is changing.  No longer do successful games need to enable modding and user content, putting the experience squarely back in the hands of the designers.  Will this be the norm for games in the future, or will more open-ended platforms reign?

via What we (and Activision) learned from Modern Warfare 2.

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