29 June 2023 , 12:00
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During the ongoing case between the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and Microsoft, we've learned some previously unknown details about Call of Duty.
The majority of discourse surrounding the Microsoft Activision deal has been in regards to Call of Duty, and what's set to happen to one of gaming's biggest franchises once Xbox owns it (especially after titles like Starfield were made exclusive to Xbox Series X|S). So as you would expect, the ongoing court case between the FTC and Microsoft has had a lot of discussion around Call of Duty.
One titbit that came out of the case via a letter penned by PlayStation boss Jim Ryan which was submitted as evidence. A majority of the letter was redacted, but as IGN pointed out whoever was in charge of redacting info on the PlayStation side didn't do the best job (although neither did Microsoft, as it turns out the news about Xbox wanting to buy Sega was supposed to be redacted too).
Sony's Call of Duty revenue revealed
The biggest piece of news from the Sony camp is that Call of Duty "directly generated over $800million" in the US for Sony in 2021. Which I'm sure we can all agree is a lot of money to potentially lose out on.
To further this, The Verge found in another part in the document that reportedly over 6million PlayStation users spent more than 70% of their time on Call of Duty, and about 1million PlayStation users spent 100% of their gaming time on Call of Duty, which isn't an insignificant number.
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Warzone Mobile release window confirmed
While Sony's end of the case was filled with nothing but bad news, Call of Duty fans did get one bit of info to be excited about, and that was Activision CEO Bobby Kotick confirming Warzone Mobile would be arriving this Autumn.
Kotick took the stand in the trial (once again reported by IGN) to talk about the ramifications of the Activision buyout and the potential of Call of Duty becoming exclusive. While Kotick thinks PlayStation would be fine if the deal went through thanks to its 'enormous competitive advantage in its ability to develop new IP'; he admits that he personally doesn't want Call of Duty to become an Xbox exclusive saying that it would be "very detrimental to our business” if PlayStation lost access to the series.