It is so frustrating ...

Originally Posted by recoilfx

Plus, I think Ubisoft isn't going to allocate that much marketing resources for a niche game, we are not going to have a final website till probably really close to launch. If they spend all their resources now, they will have much less to work with at the launch of the game.

This right here!

Going to the N.American Ubisoft site I'm met with a flash bar with 15 titles. Every single one of them is a Console title. About 1/2 of them are ported to the PC. This should be all the proof you need that COD will be a "redheaded-stepchild that crazy abusive daddy keeps locked in the basement". They, like most publishers now are fixated on consoles and the initial "big bucks sales". They care about titles that ship a few million the first week, not some title that might ship 100,000 over a 10 year period, 90% of those sales at a discounted rate years after initial release.

What might really hurt COD is the way Ubisoft sells it.

If Ubisoft don't make it avaliable to people at the same time, in physical and downloadable formats then there is the chance that people will pirate it in larger numbers. It's that initial week where you make a most of your sales (for most games) and if Europe is playing it for 2 weeks before N. American and Australia, then you're going to see a lot of people who can't wait and say to themselves. . . .

"I want this game so bad, and everyone is playing it, maybe I'll just download it, play it for a week, and then buy it when it's avaliable."

They download, play it, and when it hits stores or their favourite download site they don't bother deleting the pirated version and skip the legit copy.

It's happened before, and could happen again. With a little bit of planning Ubisoft could avoid losing some of those "on the fence" players.