Photo: Activision

Famed video games soothsayer Michael Pachter believes that a Call of Duty subscription service is inevitable, if not imminent, and he believes that up to 5 million gamers will sign up for the service. Cue the Call of Duty MMO calls again.

Soft software sales a concern

NPD numbers for June showed software sales declining 15 per cent over sales during the same period last year. This marked more than three consecutive months in 2010 where less software was sold than in the prior year, prompting analysts and executives at gaming companies to rethink their sales strategies.

Call of Duty subscription a necessity

Michael Pachter, the famous Wedbush Morgan gaming analyst, puts these depressed sales figures down to multiplayer games, which lead to people buying fewer games because they keep playing the same one.

Photo: Stock.Xchng

He believes this reality should force Activision Blizzard to release Call of Duty with an add-on subscription service. In an advisor’s note, he says: ‘We estimate that a total of 12 million consumers are playing Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 for an average of 10 hours per week on the two platforms’ respective networks’, [Xbox Live and PSN] and that this ‘has sucked the available time away from what otherwise would be spent playing newly purchased games’. Pachter then added that they (Wedbush Morgan) think this is a bad thing, and that publishers must figure out a way to recapture revenue from these lost players.

Michael Pachter adds that, ‘We think that it is incumbent upon Activision, with the most popular multiplayer game [Call of Duty], to take the first step to address monetization of multiplayer (gaming)’. He has a point, considering the runaway success the company has with World of WarCraft.

While he readily admits he’s not sure how Activision would go about this, it is clear that the folks at Activision Blizzard are thinking about the problem, too. We’ve wondered if a Call of Duty MMO was on the cards previously, too, considering others rake in the money from Call of Duty online play.

We’ll see.

Photo: Infinity Ward

Infamous Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick has taken the time to come off his money pile to speak to journalists and commoners amongst us about, oh, the business of making money, of course. What else? In short, Kotick again hinted at the possibility of a Call of Duty MMO as well as discussing why he wants some of that Microsoft money.

60 per cent just for COD

Bobby Kotick told the Financial Times that Activision Blizzard ‘heard that 60 per cent of [Microsoft's] subscribers are principally on Live because of Call of Duty’. Whether that figure is accurate is unclear, but it sure is great validation for the game. What is not great is that Activision sees none of that money. Kotick continues, saying, ‘We don’t really participate financially in that income stream,’ before espousing how much more value the company would add if the lucrative network did not belong to Microsoft exclusively.

And how lucrative a network it is, considering Microsoft charges £30.00 plus for an annual subscription to the service. Multiply that by a few million paying subscribers and you get a good understanding as to why the Activision Blizzard head honcho is not altogether happy about being cut out.

Call of Duty MMO

Photo: Blizzard

In addressing this issue, many immediately recalled an interview with Bobby Kotick where he claimed fans of the franchise were clamouring for a Call of Duty MMO, saying if he could, he would absolutely see it happen. And why not? World of Warcraft, which happens to be part of Activision Blizzard and is the most successful MMO of all time, has 11 million subscribers who pay $20 every month to play the game. Doing the maths on that indicates why Kotick would want to see it happen with COD, though at this stage the company will continue to retail the game as a packaged goods product with downloadable content for additional revenue streams.

License to print money

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 is on store shelves right now, and is one of the best selling video games of all time already, having been released in November 2009. The title continues to do well, even though there was some unrest at developer Infinity Ward recently. The incoming Call of Duty: Black Ops by another Activision Studio, Treyarch, is widely expected to outsell everything else this year when it releases on 9 November 2010, for the PS3, Xbox 360 and PC.

Would you subscribe to a Call of Duty MMO and how would you expect it to work, exactly?