VIEW GALLERY – 3 IMAGES Call of Duty is the top shooter series of all time. It’s a franchise that helps Microsoft and Sony make a combined billion each year (even with the 30% split). We’ve already estimated that Sony (and Microsoft) would lose hundreds of millions if Call of Duty moves away from PlayStation platforms if Microsoft’s $68.7 billion Activision-Blizzard deal closes, but Sony has issued no official comments reiterating how important Call of Duty is to gaming. In an official response to Brazil’s Council for Economic Defense (CADE), as found on this website and machine translated for this article, Sony’s legal representation said that Call of Duty is unparalleled in the gaming industry. The deal shows that Call of Duty exclusivity could be a paradigm shift for the gaming market. “No other developer can devote the same level of resources and expertise to game development. Even if they could, Call of Duty is too established that no competitor – no matter how important – can top it. Call of Duty has been the top-selling game almost every year for the past decade, and for its genre, it’s overwhelmingly the best-selling game. It’s synonymous with first-person shooters and practically defines the category.” We know that Call of Duty had over $3 billion in revenue in 2020 and Call of Duty Mobile brought in over $1.5 billion in revenue. Activision also sold 25 million Call of Duty games in 2021. To date, the Call of Duty franchise has earned over $30 billion. While unclear, Sony’s comments could be seen as an argument against platform exclusivity for the Call of Duty franchise. The Sony consultant says, however, that there is currently no exclusive franchise that could change the balance of power across platforms. “Exclusive games are a competitive factor between Microsoft and SIE, although neither company has yet developed or acquired an exclusive game that has decisively shifted the balance in favor of a console. This is because exclusive games are less popular and represent less revenue than third-party AAA games, which until then have been available on Xbox and PlayStation.”
