After Modern Warfare 3 outage, Activision offers fans a perk

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 servers on Xbox Live went down, spoiling the Friday night entertainment plans for millions of fans. But the service is now back up and game publisher Activision Blizzard seems like it will make a peace offering to those who are angry about it.

Outages have become a big deal in the multiplayer gaming world, as millions upon millions of fans are staying busy playing their favorite games year round.

Robert Bowling, creative strategist, at Activision’s Infinity Ward, tweeted last night, “I say we keep Double XP going for a bit longer than just the weekend to make up for lost time. What do you think?”

It’s a small perk, but at least it’s something. So far, we haven’t heard an explanation for the outage or how widespread it was. Modern Warfare 3 outages have been rare.

Meanwhile, Bowling also tweeted, “Do not accept game invites or join Private Matches from any player you don’t know & trust in #MW3. There are dirtbags up to dirtbag things.” That seems like a reference to hackers who take over your Xbox Live account and make unauthorized purchases.

Dean Takahashi

Dean Takahashi is editorial director for GamesBeat at VentureBeat. He has been a tech journalist since 1988, and he has covered games as a beat since 1996. He was lead writer for GamesBeat at VentureBeat from 2008 to April 2025. Prior to that, he wrote for the San Jose Mercury News, the Red Herring, the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, and the Dallas Times-Herald. He is the author of two books, "Opening the Xbox" and "The Xbox 360 Uncloaked." He organizes the annual GamesBeat Next, GamesBeat Summit and GamesBeat Insider Series: Hollywood and Games conferences and is a frequent speaker at gaming and tech events. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.