Call of Duty and a number of first-party titles from Activision Blizzard, and Zenimax (including Bethesda) will be making their way to Game Pass on Day One of launch according to Microsoft Gaming Chief Phil Spencer. The situation around the flagship title from Activision Blizzard has kept fans waiting. Up until now, Call of Duty and other major titles being confirmed for Microsoft’s monthly subscription offering has been a little bit vague.
In a recent interview with Game File, Spencer would address a number of topics including the Call of Duty franchise and those from Activision Blizzard when pressed about them coming to the Game Pass.
”Our intent is the full portfolio of games from ZeniMax, Activision Blizzard, and XGS—Xbox Game Studios—will be on Game Pass, day one.”
Those loyal to Activision and Blizzard have been kept in limbo about the existing games catalog and any new titles to come. Spencer was again tight-lipped on the timings, but did say that “we’re doing the back end work to make them come to PC and console simultaneously.”
Now that Microsoft is in charge, after one of the biggest gaming takeovers in history, those loyal to the brands will be hoping for more information.
The only Blizzard title that has a launch date for Game Pass is Diablo IV. This was announced by Spencer and a panel in a recent landmark Xbox podcast. The top-down dungeon crawler set in the world of Sanctuary comes to Game Pass on March 28.
Head in the cloud?
During the Game File interview, Spencer did dwell on the topic of cloud vs console gaming, saying that “gaming consoles themselves have kind of become the last consumer electronic device that has a drive.”
”And this is a real issue, just in terms of the number of manufacturers that are actually building drives and the cost associated with those, he continued.”
Spencer concluded, “I will say our strategy does not hinge on people moving all-digital,” he said. “And getting rid of physical, that’s not a strategic thing for us.”
Microsoft’s gaming arm had announced cuts of 1900 jobs very early into 2024 and recently made the move to have the entire existing Xbox catalog present on the Game Pass.
Spencer would say on the cuts “You know, the cost of building the products inclusive of the people who work on them—I need to make sure we have enough of the right people and the right number of people in the right places for us to succeed.”
He would mention the teams involved in the Activision Blizzard takeover stating that the need for these cuts was more about “alignment of our teams across ZeniMax, Activision, and Xbox. So we have teams that are in charge of physical retail, inclusive of selling games in physical outlets. So that’s what the team action was. It wasn’t about us getting rid of the capability.”
So it seems there are teams working on Activision Blizzard titles post-takeover and that they will be coming to the Game Pass, but those loyal to them will have to wait on Spencer and Microsoft’s ‘back-end work’ to make them available.
