Microsoft recently let go of their partnership with the Call of Duty franchise that gave players expansions one month early, exclusive to Xbox consoles. Since the release of Call of Duty: Black Ops II, sales figures of the Call of Duty franchise have dropped year after year. Even though sales are high in comparison with many other large titles, we have seen the numbers begin to drop rapidly since 2011. It may have been a good move by Microsoft to let this deal go, especially when forecasting the future.
When Call of Duty: Ghosts launched, it was reported that sales were down 19% on Black Ops II, and 36% when compared to Modern Warfare 3. Since, the sales have not increased, and still forecasted to be on the decline. Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare sales were supposedly down 27% last year, compared to Call of Duty: Ghosts. Activision are still making a large profit from Call of Duty, and its other large properties, however sales look to be on the biggest decline yet. Even though the franchise is a big entity right now, we appear to have passed its peak.
2015 is the year of exclusives for Microsoft, and even though they don’t have a game with as high sales figures as Call of Duty, they are still managing many major IPs, and distributing them on the Xbox One platform over the first few years after launch. This year we will see Halo 5: Guardians, Rise of the Tomb Raider, and Forza Motorsport 6 arrive on the console, all published in-house at Microsoft Studios. This is arguably one of the best years for the Xbox and its exclusives, which have been heavy emphasised at press events previously this year.
This year’s Xbox E3 Media Briefing started with Halo 5: Guardians, showing a glimpse at the campaign gameplay expected when it drops this fall. In previous years, this spot has been reserved for the Call of Duty franchise, with a small single player gameplay snippet, showing some minor additions and tweaks the game has received. Last year, the 2014 press conference did exactly this. Halo is now being heavily pushed by Microsoft, and after the feedback since Halo 4, 343 Industries have evolved Halo around what the community want, and what will be successful. Microsoft are treating Halo 5: Guardians like a premium franchise, and after Halo: The Master Collection, are allowing the developers to design the game with the community heavily influencing their choices.
Since a large drop in active players post-launch for Halo 4, and Halo: The Master Chief Collection, 343 Industries hope to keep Halo 5 alive and active, not only by delivering a good base game, but by also developing content for the future, which will release for free to all players. This further lessens the divide between players, and gives many an incentive to return from releases in 2016.
Microsoft helped to fund many tournaments for the Call of Duty franchise, and many professional players also moved to the platform, not only for the timed-exclusivity, but also the support on a competitive level. With this partnership now gone, it is likely that Sony will have to help fund these events, if this is supposedly the ‘new home’ of the franchise.
Microtransactions in Halo 5: Guardians for ‘REQ packs’ (which give items and skins in multiplayer) are a new way for money to be made from Halo post-launch, with the lack of paid DLC. Similar to what Valve did with Dota 2, a portion of the profits from these sales, will go to the Halo Championship Series, and support competitive Halo in the future.
Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 looks like it will suffer, not only due to lack of marketing so far, but also because the established player base is on Xbox One. Playstation currently houses the early exclusivity, however when you have a smaller community, it may not work out perfectly. Halo 5: Guardians looks to be Microsoft’s main first person shooter, and with Call of Duty now having less of a focus, money can be put towards first-party entities.
What do you think of the change in partnership? Let us know in the comments!
Matt was a regular ICXM contributor in 2015, publishing 110 articles across game reviews, Windows and PC, and Xbox news. Their work focused on hands-on reviews, platform commentary, and breaking-news reporting during the Xbox One’s first full year of post-launch coverage, including the early days of Backwards Compatibility and Windows 10 gaming. They post on X as @RTEnvi.