Have some of your buddies on PlayStation Network already started playing Modern Warfare 2 this past weekend? If so, it’s probably because GameStop gave certain retail locations the go ahead in order to sell MW2 way ahead of its street date. The largest games retailer in North America chose to make this move due to mom and pop shops selling the same early as well and didn’t want to alienate the consumer by not matching that offering. In other words, they didn’t want to lose sales (money).

According to Chris Olivera, VP for Corporate Communications at GameStop’s Grapevine, Texas location, GameStop had been in talks with Activision about the decision for quite some time. He recently sent this email to Kotaku.

“This past weekend, GameStop made the decision to break street date and sell reserved copies of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 in select markets where other retailers had broken street date. Our decision followed many conversations with Activision and was an effort to protect our customer base.”

However, Activision has stated that they have given no company permission to break the street date for MW2. It’ll be interesting to see if Activision takes any action against such a major retail chain.