Call of Duty as Role Model for Activision Blizzard's IPs
Activision Blizzard intends to follow the pattern developed by Call of Duty when developing its other IPs. This means emphasis on premium content, mobile titles and free-to-play, among other things.
Activision Blizzard published an interesting statement. During its investor call, the company announced that it wants to develop all of its IPs in the direction established by Call of Duty. As reported by Geoff Keighley on Twitter, this is to manifest itself in the release of premium "content", expansion into the mobile market and the use of F2P model.
It's hardly surprising that Activision wants to use its flagship series as a role model for other games. The Call of Duty series is undoubtedly one of the biggest brands on the video game market. Over the years, successive installments of the series have proven to be the biggest bestsellers of the year, making this 2003-born series one of the best-selling franchises in history. The successes of the main CoD games were also repeated by the free Warzone and Call of Duty: Mobile, and Acivision Blizzard hopes that the upcoming Diablo Immortal will be no different.
Although in the context of the above facts the publisher's announcement does not come as a surprise, most Internet users received the message without enthusiasm. As one can easily guess, the concerns are mainly related to the mention of F2P and mobile releases (we could see how players feel about those after Diablo Immortal was announced) and related microtransactions. Not everyone is thrilled with Call of Duty being held up as a role model, despite the series' undeniable financial success. Of course, it's better to wait with the assessment of Activision Blizzard's new policy until the company presents more tangible information. We'll probably have to wait a bit longer for that especially since the publisher's two most anticipated projects will hit the market not earlier than next year.
