While Microsoft’s intention to buy Activision Blizzard rocked the industry, it also raised many questions. Some concern the feasibility of such an operation, others the profitability of the maneuver, but unquestionably the future call of Duty is the one that was on everyone’s lips. Will the famous shooter license become exclusive to the Xbox system ecosystem? According to new information from Bloomberg, echoing Phil Spencer’s words, the next three Call Of Duty games will be available on Playstation. To ? This looks much more uncertain for the time being.
3 Call of Duty… and then it works?
While the Xbox boss recently spoke to reassure players, the journalist said J ason Schreier
- Modern warfare 2 (Infinity Ward) from late 2022
- call of Duty 2023, developed by Treyarch
- A new version of Call of Duty: Warzone, which will also be launched in 2023.
According to Phil Spencer’s announcement, the existing contracts will therefore be honored. But once these three games are marketed, nothing seems to be done for the future. And if the boss has “expressed his wish” to keep the license on the Sony platform, anything is still possible. With an acquisition of up to $69 billion, the American company may very well wish to keep subsequent works solely on its ecosystem to give itself a competitive edge.
In doing so, he would certainly miss out on a significant windfall in revenue from Playstation players, but would clearly gain new Xbox customers, and Game Pass in particular. But the reversal seems just as credible so far, especially since Microsoft seems to be less concerned with Sony’s competition than Amazon’s or Google’s, which obviously won’t benefit from the next one Call of Duty.
Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard is expected to take effect within the next 18 months. Once that is done, Phil Spencer, as President of Microsoft Gaming, can provide more clarity on the future of the license if he so desires. Be it the seasonality of Call of Duty, which may no longer be an annual franchise, or its availability on other media, the decision will be largely up to him and his business acumen!
In any case, for us Xbox players, it seems assumed that the next releases will all be made directly in Xbox Game Pass. And this is undoubtedly the most effective element!