Identify a breakout star, a genuine fan of the Call of Duty franchise, who had the capacity to capture national media and consumer attention.

There was also a need to create a must-see activation plan with talent in a way that only Call of Duty could do. If our competition was doing it, it wouldn’t work for Activision.

We could then utilize the celebrity fan’s involvement throughout the year to secure a broad spectrum of enthusiastic media coverage that reinforced Call of Duty’s presence in popular culture.

The aim: create an authentic collaboration with talent that would turn heads and break new ground for a video game brand, propelling Call of Duty even further into mainstream entertainment and pop culture.

A first for both brands, we succeeded in securing an exclusive cover story with ESPN the Magazine, announcing the worldwide reveal of Marshawn Lynch’s Call of Duty in-game involvement.

ESPN brought a crew to Activision’s state-of-the-art performance capture studio and game developer Treyarch’s office to shadow Marshawn throughout the performance capture phase and document the process of putting him into the game.

We then worked with ESPN to set up a photo and video shoot to capture exclusive content for the magazine feature and online story. Additionally, Marshawn participated in his one and only pre-reveal interview, giving ESPN the exclusive, worldwide unveiling of his in-game involvement.

In the weeks following the studio visit, we worked with ESPN’s editorial team, providing needed assets, including: key game information, developer interviews, exclusive images, video footage and the digitally-rendered portion of the magazine cover image.

The pitch and placement took three months total.

Marshawn Lynch’s ESPN the Magazine cover achieved the desired crossover effect between Call of Duty and sports, making history as the first-ever cover story for Call of Duty on the iconic sports publication, and the publication’s first cover to ever feature a video game.

Beyond delivering a broad spectrum of positive stories (232+), we secured top-tier press beyond core game outlets, including: SportsCenter, USA Today Online, Sports Illustrated Online, Fox Sports Online, Yahoo! Sports, Mashable and Adweek.

The partnership also resulted in high-profile extensions, including two television appearances on TBS’ Conan. Additionally, Marshawn later took part in the highly-anticipated live-action television trailer alongside Michael B. Jordan and Cara Delevingne, which has garnered over 17M views on YouTube alone.

Ultimately, Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 became the biggest entertainment launch of 2015, garnering $550 million in opening-weekend sales, surpassing the opening weekend box office of Star Wars: Episode VII.

The Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 collaboration with Marshawn Lynch set the tone for the entire year and helped break new ground for the video game franchise.

As a first-of-its-kind for both the Call of Duty franchise and ESPN the Magazine, Marshawn’s participation within the game made waves in the world of pop culture. Marshawn's reticence for the public eye made his vote of confidence in Call of Duty all the more impactful.

The campaign helped rewrite how a PR-led celebrity collaboration works in the gaming world and beyond, bringing attention to the popular franchise in all new ways.

We enlisted transcendent football superstar Marshawn Lynch, a longtime Call of Duty fan, to work with Activision for the Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 campaign throughout 2015. Marshawn’s stellar football skills, off-field antics and general apprehension toward press cast an inescapable media spotlight on whatever he did. Knowing this, Activision and game developer Treyarch offered Marshawn the opportunity to appear as a character in Call of Duty: Black Ops 3, which he enthusiastically accepted.

To maximize the news of Marshawn’s involvement in Call of Duty: Black Ops 3, we set our sights on securing an exclusive cover story with ESPN the Magazine. As a major gateway news outlet, coverage from ESPN’s multiple channels would have the desired effect of spreading like wildfire to other media outlets.

The collaboration with Marshawn was designed to galvanize anticipation for Black Ops 3 and create media cycles that reverberated beyond the core.

On Friday, November 6, 2015, Activision launched the most anticipated video game of the year: Call of Duty: Black Ops 3.

As the world’s most popular first-person action game, the Call of Duty franchise has legions of fans who have extremely high expectations for each new game release. Going into the twelfth major iteration of the franchise, the competition and expectations had never been higher.

The objective: win hearts and minds of consumers and press, outshine other first-person shooter franchises and turn Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 into a major pop culture event in 2015. Target audiences included the franchise’s millions of Call of Duty fans, players of action games, and a broad spectrum of enthusiast, consumer, entertainment and sports media who cover games and entertainment.