Call of Duty on Xbox Game Pass could still happen this year as Xbox president appears to confirm Activision games will hit the subscription service
Call of Duty might have been confirmed for Xbox Game Pass, as Xbox president Sarah Bond says "the whole slate" of games will be available on the subscription service.
In an interview with Bloomberg, Sarah Bond explains the benefits of Game Pass. She says that "importantly, you get every single one of our games that we build day one in Game Pass." Espousing the quality and depth of the titles available on the service over the past few years, Bond goes on to tease that "you're going to see even more big games coming into Game Pass later this year."
That prompts the interviewer to ask whether Bond is referring to games from "across Activision's portfolio," to which the Xbox president replies, "Across the whole slate."
That appears to be Bond confirming that Activision games will be coming to Game Pass. That's significant as earlier this week, a report by The Verge suggested that Call of Duty's inclusion on Game Pass was still a matter of a long-term internal debate at Xbox. Some developers are concerned that the influx of revenue generated by a new Call of Duty game would be undermined by its inclusion on the subscription service.
Last year, Phil Spencer said that neither Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 nor Diablo 4 would come to Game Pass in 2023 due to the complex legality of the Activision's high-profile merger with Xbox. Future plans for the series weren't outlined at the time, and Bond certainly doesn't say that Call of Duty 2024 will be on Game Pass this year, but unless Microsoft plans to bring a suite of much older Activision titles to its service, Call of Duty does likely remain the biggest pull.
Bond's comments come after a bad week for Xbox, as it announced the immediate closure of four studios, including Dishonored and Prey developer Arkane Austin, and Tango Gameworks, the team behind the acclaimed Hi-Fi Rush. The company's philosophy behind those closures doesn't appear to have been clear, and Bond herself struggled to explain exactly what had gone wrong at Tango at another point in this interview. The winds of public opinion have been blowing against Xbox this week, which could make for a difficult time during its showings in the SGF schedule.
Call of Duty 2024 is expected to be revealed after this summer's Xbox Game Showcase.
