According to GameSpot, Microsoft announced that the Call of Duty franchise was the top performer on Xbox Game Pass for the entire year of 2025. It ranked first in two key categories: total number of players and total hours played. This announcement arrived shortly after Activision released a separate statement acknowledging that *Call of Duty: Black Ops 7* fell short of the publisher’s own expectations. In that statement, Activision pledged to stop making back-to-back yearly releases of direct sequels, like *Black Ops 6* and *7* were. The company promised to focus on delivering “unique” experiences each year with “meaningful” innovation instead of incremental updates.
The Mixed Messages Are Loud And Clear
Here’s the thing: these two statements, landing almost on top of each other, tell a very conflicted story. On one hand, Microsoft is touting a massive engagement win for its subscription service. But on the other, the actual game developer is basically admitting the latest entry was a creative and commercial letdown. So what gives?
It’s entirely plausible for both things to be true. Game Pass lowers the barrier to entry dramatically. For a franchise as huge as Call of Duty, being “free” in a subscription millions already pay for guarantees massive player counts and logged hours. People will try it, dabble in multiplayer, and move on. That doesn’t translate to strong sales, critical acclaim, or player satisfaction. It just means it was there, and it’s Call of Duty. One analyst even blamed the game’s poor performance on “burnout, poor creative decisions, and its use of AI slop.” Ouch.
The Real Story Is Sequel Fatigue
Activision’s vow to stop the back-to-back *Modern Warfare* or *Black Ops* sequels is the most telling part of all this. They’re admitting the model is broken. Releasing a direct sequel every single year doesn’t give teams enough time to innovate, and players are clearly getting tired of it. The promise of “meaningful, not incremental” innovation is what fans have wanted for years. But it’s a promise we’ve heard before from big publishers. I’ll believe it when I see it.
And this creates a weird tension with Game Pass itself. Does having the franchise on the service encourage complacency? If you know a new, somewhat iterative CoD is just going to drop into your subscription every November, where’s the urgency to buy it? The engagement metrics look great for Microsoft, but they might be masking a deeper erosion of the brand’s premium value.
Is This Battlefield’s Moment?
Now, the big question: can anyone actually capitalize on this? The article notes that EA’s *Battlefield 6* had sold 10 million copies by early November. That’s a solid number, but Call of Duty hasn’t been beaten as the top-selling shooter franchise since 2006. A stumble by CoD is the best chance a competitor has had in nearly two decades.
But here’s the catch. Winning on Game Pass metrics and winning in overall cultural and sales dominance are two different battles. Microsoft can claim a service victory while Activision licks its wounds from a weak release. The real test is whether this admission of fatigue leads to a genuinely better game—and if players who felt burned by *Black Ops 7* will even care by the time it arrives.
