A new leak from Capcom shows that they reportedly used fake leaks to drum up excitement for Resident Evil 3 Remake, ahead of its official announcement.
In a thread posted on ResetEra, confidential marketing material showed that marketing for Resident Evil 3 was split up into 3 major “Beats” with the first one being fake leaks about the game releasing early.
“A fake leak will antagonize core fanbase right from the start and marketing teams will play catch up afterwards”, the slide reads.
The slide also mentions that they didn’t want to mention Resistance- the game’s multiplayer mode, referred to in the slides as Outbreakers- right from the start.
“We’d like to lead with SP (single-player) only at announcement and hint at additional content- securing positive audience sentiment right at the start”, the slide reads.
Capcom has not commented on the leaks to verify their existence, but given the massive leak the company faced earlier this year, there’s a good chance it’s real.
Fake leaks have always been a rumored existence in the games in the games industry. Often times big announcements would always “leak” just ahead of big shows like TGS or E3, giving more fans a reason to tune in to the exhibition.
While we’ve never had confirmation of them existing as a tactic, this slide seems to change that- companies know it works, if the slides are to be believed.
It’s not entirely crazy to think so, too- EA was famous back in the 2000s for doing false outrage campaigns to promote their games. Most famously, they hired actors to pretend to be conservatives protesting their upcoming title, Dante’s Inferno.