Hasta La Creative!

Activision has booked some heavy-hitting talent for the the ninth edition of the “Call of Duty” franchise, “Black Ops 2,” which it’s kept closely under wraps. The live-action “trailer” created out of 72andSunny and released today features Robert Downey Jr. in his first-ever North American TV ad and French movie star Omar Sy. It’s directed by Guy Ritchie (Mr. Downey’s director in the “Sherlock Holmes” films) and will debut tonight on TV during Monday Night Football on ESPN.

Last year’s release crossed the $1 billion sales threshold in 16 days, so expectations are high. Video-game marketing typically relies on carefully orchestrated releases to fire up franchise loyalists, which is why the mid-year leak of details about “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3” in 2011 was a PR crisis for the company, but one that it managed to turn into an opportunity to connect with fans, Activision CEO Eric Hirshberg has said.

But this year, the theme of the marketing has been “surprise,” according to chief marketing officer Tim Ellis, now culminating with Mr. Downey’s appearance in the TV spot. It began with the tapping of weapons blogger FPSRussia — known for blowing things up on his site — to post a video of himself reviewing a prototype of a futuristic weapon that he said wouldn’t be available for another decade “but might just be in the next Call of Duty game” in late April. It served to tip off fans to the near-future 2025 setting of “Black Ops 2,” “a big surprise and a major piece of news for the community,” Mr. Ellis said, and to tee up the game-play trailer, which first aired during the NBA playoffs and now has almost 27 million YouTube views.

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