Call of Duty Modern Warfare Battle Pass launching in December
New in-game system arriving “slightly later than originally planned”
Activision will launch Call of Duty: Modern Warfare‘s first Battle Pass in December, the company confirmed during its third quarter earnings call on Thursday.
Chief financial officer Dennis Durkin said: “We will support other key franchises with a stream of content, services, events and features [in Q4]. This includes our new in-game system for Modern Warfare, which begins in December, slightly later than originally planned.”
Activision president Robert Kostich later added: “We’re also implementing a new Battle Pass system and it’s going to launch later this quarter.
“We feel it’s the right thing to do for the game and how it’s designed, and more importantly we think it’s the right thing to do for our players. That launch is still ahead of us, but we’ve been really encouraged by the early response from the community to the change that we’re making there.”
Modern Warfare Battle Passes will launch timed to new, post-launch live seasons, Activision said in October.
Each Battle Pass will have free and premium streams, with players able to see all the content they are earning or buying.
“All functional content that has an impact on game balance, such as base weapons and attachments, can be unlocked simply by playing the game” and earning COD Points, according to the publisher.
The premium stream and Modern Warfare’s in-game store will include cosmetic items that don’t impact game balance.
Modern Warfare launched on October 25 and Activision previously called it the fastest-selling Call of Duty game this console generation after three days of availability, during which it generated $600 million worldwide.
Activision said on Thursday that in its first week, Modern Warfare sales grew a high-teen percentage compared to 2018’s Call of Duty: Black Ops 4, “with strong console growth and PC units on Battle.net reaching new highs”.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare will get two new multiplayer maps and Hardpoint mode on all platforms on Friday November 8.
Developer Infinity Ward also said on Wednesday it was gearing up to release a new Call of Duty: Modern Warfare update designed to reduce crashes on all platforms.
For its third quarter ended September 30, 2019, Activision Blizzard reported declines in several key metrics including sales, profit and engagement.
Net revenues were down 15% year-over-year to $1.28 billion, with digital sales accounting for 79% ($1.01 billion) of the total. Net bookings fell 27% year-over-year to $1.21 billion, and net income declined 22% year-over-year to $204 million.
Activision Blizzard said it had 316 million monthly active users during the quarter, down from 345 million a year earlier in Q3 2018, and down from 327 million in Q2 2019.
Despite the declines, the publisher beat its previous quarterly revenue forecast and increased its full year revenue outlook by 2% to $6.315 billion.
Activision also said on Thursday that World of Warcraft Classic‘s release in August drove a record quarterly increase in the MMO’s subscriber base.
