Have Your Say: Call of Duty Subscription Fee Feature

Harry Gordon Selfridge once claimed, “The customer is always right”.  It’s a phrase that has governed the world of consumerism to varying degrees ever since.  Yet Activision-Blizzard’s CEO Bobby Kotick has a long history of irritating his customers but still finding himself in the enviable position where such anger ultimately doesn’t detract from his company’s sales.  

Despite calls to boycott sales of Modern Warfare 2 following the increased RRP and lack of dedicated servers, worldwide sales surpassed the 20 million mark, making the game one of the most successful in video games history.

Amongst the comments that have irked frustrated gamers, Kotick’s repeated calls for a subscription fee coming to the Call of Duty franchise have perhaps caused the most consternation.  Looking back it’s an idea that Activision has clearly been contemplating for a considerable period.  The first mention of an ‘MMO styled subscription’ appeared in a survey almost exactly a year ago.  

This was followed towards the end of 2009, when Activision-Blizzard’s Thomas Tippl became the first executive to actually acknowledge such a concept was on the cards and suggested that Blizzard’s success with World of Warcraft was influencing decisions regarding the Call of Duty franchise, and vice-versa.

In 2010 Activision’s Bobby Kotick delivered the clearest indication yet that subscription fees would be coming to Call of Duty.

“If you think about the success that we've had in other product categories on subscription you can get a sense of the direction that we want to take that [Call of Duty] franchise," Kotick claimed to investors during a conference call.

When asked more recently about the one decision he would make if he could, Kotick claimed:

"I would have Call of Duty be an online subscription service tomorrow. When you think about what the audience's interests are and how you could really satisfy bigger audiences with more inspired, creative opportunities, I would love to see us have an online Call of Duty world. I think our players would just have so much of a more compelling experience."

So it certainly seems as though the idea has been germinating at Activision for a considerable time, and from a balanced perspective you’d have to ascertain that this will be coming to Call of Duty perhaps quicker than some would imagine.