Today, Kotaku ran a report claiming that Call of Duty 2020 will be developed by Treyarch and be Black Ops 5. According to the outlet's sources, lead developers on the game -- Sledgehammer Games and Raven Software -- were replaced by Treyarch for multiple reasons, but mostly because the project was a mess and causing issues between the two studios. That said, buried in the same report is an interesting detail that pertains to this year's Call of Duty from Infinity Ward, which appears to be Modern Warfare 4.

According to Kotaku, while Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 sold well at first, it hasn't generated the revenue tail that Activision was hoping it would. And so, internally, Activision executives have started to talk about "embracing" free-to-play and the revenue model that comes with free-to-play. As you may know, Activision has never fancied the free-to-play model, but according to mutiple sources, it is looking into offering a free-to-play component for Modern Warfare 4. The talks are apparently still ongoing, with some within Activision notably not keen on the idea.

As you may know, the free-to-play model has seen a resurgence lately, mostly thanks to the astronomical success of Fortnite. In other words, it's not very surprising to hear Activision is flirting with the model, especially as Call of Duty's market presence wanes.

For years, many have suggested that Call of Duty make its multiplayer free-to-play, while charging for its campaign and other modes, such as Zombies. Whether this will be how it will approach free-to-play, who knows, but it's interesting to hear that Activision is looking to dip its toes into that market.

Of course, Call of Duty still sells ridiculously well each year. So, there's no reason for Activision to do anything drastic, but there's no doubting that the series peaked awhile ago, and if Activision wants the series to continue to get bigger and bigger, it will need to change things up.

Posted: May 19, 2019 9:28 am
Related Forum: Call of Duty Forum

Source: https://comicbook.com/gaming/2019/05/18/call-of-duty-modern-warfare-4-2019-free-to-play/