Call of Duty News: Activision Boss Discusses Serialized Franchise

Call of Duty has been in the news recently, as Black Ops 2 releases the final piece of DLC for the game and Ghosts prepares to launch on current and next-gen consoles. While some fans may be concerned that the annual franchise may eventually suffer due to the constant releases for the series, Activision CEO Eric Hirshberg told Eurogamer that he is confident their model is the right one for the series:

"The cadence of the releases seems to have found a nice equilibrium with people's appetite...There's demand and excitement each and every time out. Then people are playing throughout the year. We have our biggest community of players today. Right now there are more people playing Call of Duty today than ever, which is remarkable for a franchise that's been around as long as Call of Duty has. But, we don't take anything for granted."

Hirshberg also explained that having two different studios (Treyarch and Infinity Ward) develop the games helps keep the series fresh both for gamers and for the people actually creating the games:

"Having alternating studios is one of the secrets to the franchise's success...You have different creative people who are strong willed and have minds of their own. Everyone gets what makes a great Call of Duty game. Treyarch and IW are the masters, and have built this thing. So, there's a lot of common DNA from year to year. But then people come in and want to top each other. There's some healthy competition. There's a desire within the creative team to not do the same thing and not be stagnant, the same way there is in the player community. Overall it seems to be a good system."

Hirshberg stated that this will be a critical year in the series history, as the new consoles launch and Call of Duty and other franchises try to gain or keep traction. The CEO is confident that the marquee franchise will continue to dominate the market:

"We're already operating at a scale that's fairly unprecedented in the industry. Obviously we would love to grow further, but that depends on a lot of variables that are beyond our control. That depends on a successful console transition. What I will say is we have managed to continue to grow not only the player base but the amount of time and amount of energy people are willing to devote to the franchise. That provides a longer tail. Someone who's still playing six months after launch is more likely to be someone who might buy some DLC or a micro DLC or a digital item. Our strategy has been fairly straight forward, which is, we try to make awesome stuff that people want to buy. If we keep doing that that's a pretty good policy."

Look out for more Call of Duty news as fans transition from Black Ops 2 to Ghosts as well as new consoles.