Activision Confirms 2011 Call of Duty [UPDATE] News

Following yesterday's Call of Duty bombshell, Activision today announced further details surrounding the future of the franchise, which ultimately provides an insight into the possible reasons behind yesterday's controversy.

Despite already being an annualised franchise that fits comfortably within Activision's strategy, the US publisher confirmed plans to establish a dedicated studio that will unite the brand with "focused, dedicated resources around the world".  The Call of Duty studio will be led by Philip Earl, who currently runs Activision Publishing's Asia Pacific region and previously served in senior executive positions with Procter & Gamble and Nestle.

Today's announcement mentions the intent to expand Call of Duty with the same focus as Blizzard's business model, which hints towards the previously rumoured MMO-style subscriptions for future CoD titles. Activision is looking to focus on high-margin digital online content and furthering the CoD brand as the leading action entertainment franchise in new geographies, new genres and with new digital business models.

"2010 will be another important year for the Call of Duty franchise," stated Mike Griffith, President and CEO of Activision Publishing. "In addition to continued catalog sales, new downloadable content from Infinity Ward and a new Call of Duty release, we are excited about the opportunity to bring the franchise to new geographies, genres and players."

The company expects to release a new Call of Duty game from Treyarch this fall. In addition, Infinity Ward is in development on the first two downloadable map packs for Modern Warfare 2 for release in 2010.

Following earlier rumours that Infinty Ward wouldn't develop Modern Warfare 3 and the expected release of TreyArch's Vietnam inspired title later this year, Activision confirmed that the recently established Sledgehammer Games will develop the next CoD expected for 2011.

Sledgehammer Games is an Activision owned studio established by former Visceral Games execs Glen A. Schofield and Michael Condrey. Worryingly the announcement confirms that the Sledgehammer Games title will take the franchise into the action/adventure genre.

Where this leaves Infinity Ward appears to be anybody's guess at the moment, although the announcement does confirm the departure of Jason West and Vince Zampella.  Activision's Steve Pearce, Chief Technology Officer and Steve Ackrich, Head of Production, will lead Infinity Ward on an interim basis.

Citing inside sources, 1UP suggests that the pair were pitching an original IP to a rival publisher, possibly as a result of allegedly unpaid royalties from Modern Warfare 2, and weren't exactly pleased with the demands placed upon them to develop Modern Warfare 3.

From nothing more than idle speculation we'd anticipate that West and Zampella weren't exactly pleased about Call of Duty's future plans, and concocted a hasty exit strategy.

Update: Despite some ambiguous terminology in the Activision press release detailed above, an Activision memo uncovered by G4 appears to clarify that the publisher is talking about three separate Call of Duty games:

1. The Treyarch title that's due later this year.
2. A new game in the Call of Duty series that's scheduled for a 2011 release.
3. Sledgehammer Games' action-adventure take on the Call of Duty franchise.

Put another way, the Sledgehammer Games title isn't necessarily scheduled for a 2011 release. This an entirely different CoD project, although whether Infinity Ward is connected to the 2011 title remains unclear at this stage.