Not content with the knowledge that Modern Warfare 3 was always going to sell a ton more copies than supposed rival Battlefield 3, gaming research firm Raptr decided to track how many hours people spent actually playing both games.
Using a combination of data from a 10-million "gamer network" and a 6000-person survey, Raptr found that "users logged an average of 40% more playtime in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 (Xbox 360 version) than Battlefield 3 on the respective games' launch days".
Much of the other stats say largely the same thing. That more people spent more time playing Modern Warfare 3 than Battlefield 3. Shocking, I know. But here's a single interesting find: "53% of Battlefield 3 players on Xbox 360 are also playing Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3".
The so-called rivalry between two actually quite different series did nobody any favours, least of all EA, consumers and message board moderators. It's nice seeing that "rivalry" put in perspective.
You can contact Luke Plunkett, the author of this post, at plunkett@kotaku.com. You can also find him on Twitter, Facebook, and lurking around our #tips page.