Activision Blizzard Boasts Breaking Records in Financial Results thanks to Call of Duty, Warcraft

Activision announced its financial results for the fourth quarter of 2023, related to the period between October 1, and December 31, 2022.

[Christopher]

"Following its October launch, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II delivered the highest opening-quarter sell-through in franchise history."

Seriously, it's an unstoppable juggernaut.

[bigfish]

Things will change for them drastically if the MS buyout goes ahead.

[Orchard]

In what way? I guess they'll have more funding available technically, but it's not like Activision/COD has really struggled in that department.

Maybe we'll see more investment in their other IPs like Crash, Spyro etc.

[darkrider]

From breaking sales record, the records will be shoots fired, Granades launched, players dead and so on...

[wesnytsfs]

It will be on more platforms and be part of game pass after acquisition. Nothing will change for Playstation. This deal will go thru their is zero reason for it not.

[just_looken]

Call of duty is not a juggernaut its the only big dog left in the AAA fps market.

So many jerk each other over cod mw2 without mentioning no other game came out in the same genre and that the last cods were very bad games.

But when a cod comes out with no battlefield/killzone/halo/batt lefront/dlc for apex etc it sells very well like really? so dam shocking.

Next will be articles saying it was the best military fps that came out q4 2022 you know # 1/1

[1Victor]

So does this means we can put to rest the narrative that activision is loosing money and need Microsoft to bailout activision

[Christopher]

This was never the case. The executives want a huge payout. That's all. Everything else is just selling big money into the pockets of people who already make the most money at the company.

[Orchard]

COD continues to be a beast, also not surprised it did that well, the MW series is always an 'on year' for COD and people were hungry after the 'off year' that was Vanguard. This is exactly why MS are dropping 70bn on them.

[Gamehard]

I thought they were doing it more for candy crush?

[Orchard]

I'm sure they're interested in that too, King makes a lot of money and T2 bought Zynga so they probably want some foothold in that market too.

But COD is huge in the console/PC space, no doubt about it.

[ApocalypseShadow]

Interesting to know. I wonder where the sales breakdown is? Had to have helped Sony break records during the holiday season when they had more consoles to sell on the market.

One of the reasons that Sony wants continued sales and support from this franchise. Helps fund new IPs and sequels of their blockbuster games.

[Orchard]

"One of the reasons that Sony wants continued sales and support from this franchise. "

And that they shall have. The 30% they are getting today, they will still be getting post acquisition.

And yes, games like COD, Fortnite etc and their MTX drive a lot of the 3rd party revenue that platform holders like Sony & MS report every quarter.

[343_Guilty_Spark]

Welcome to Xbox

[crazyCoconuts]

Xbox: stealing defeat from the jaws of victory

[MIDGETonSTILTS17]

And it’s not fair that two other studios will experience a boost in sales compared to their previous titles, all because they share the CoD brand name with Infinity Ward…

….but that’s how brand names work. It takes a couple of consistent bad experiences for enough people to turn away and finally kill the franchise.

And IW just manages to lure back enough OG CoD vet devs just often enough to push their games from “good” to “great” like twice a decade; and effectively rejuvenate their overall CoD brand value, just enough.

MW and MW2 were great, but they still haven’t topped CoD4’s campaign, IMO.

But, I guess they still have to release the second half of MW2’s campaign.

[darkrider]

Nothing new here. Cod numbers are always huge. That's why all the controversy of taking a game from their biggest audience. And the other ip...

[Orchard]

Sounds like a controversy about nothing in that case. COD is not being taken away from any platform, in fact, it's apparently coming to more.

[darkrider]

Of course it is. Many more platform... There are so many more... Hell, they will even give Cod for free. Microsoft is just thinking in all gamers. Because right now they can't play the game. Wait right now anybody can play Cod on console or pc...

[Orchard]

Right now it’s only available on PC, PS and Xbox. They’ve committed to bringing it to Switch after the acquisition closes.

It won’t be free but it will be in GamePass - so that’s a big win for gamers and a welcome change.

[1Victor]

Orchard “ COD is not being taken away from any platform”

Sure if the plan wasn’t to take it away why give a deadline of at first 3 years then 10 years?

Why not put in writing that they’ll keep it as is every iterations multi platform on the same day 🤔

[badz149]

I think this report is totally wrong! MS said the reason for them to buy AB is Candy Crush. So, Candy Crush must have been making so much money that they cannot be tracked anymore unlike CoD!

[CantThinkOfAUsername]

I'm more surprised by Blizzard's record revenue (43% year-over-year) given how their player base has been dwindling for years.

[CBaoth]

that's the King effect. Like you said, WoW, Diablo, Overwatch player bases have declined in recent years. CoD is a short term goal. Acquiring the biggest mobile publisher in NA is the long term goal. Remember what MS desires is to get all platforms under their control. They can't do that with phones with Google and Apple entrenched in the market and their own products flops. So they went after the largest content creator to achieve that end

[Fonsecap]

Tch... They can't say these things, what if Sony ears about this, ms won't be able to say that call of duty is not so great anymore... C'mon Activision...