So with it being revealed today that BF6 had the biggest launch month revenue wise for a game in the US since MWII back in 2022 it's basically all but confirmed that this will be the first time in about two decades that COD isn't the best selling FPS game in a year which is a really big deal. If the 2026 one isn't received well then the series could be in some genuine trouble and even then it won't matter too much if that one is considered a return to form but then the 2027 one is another MWIII or BO7. COD won't die of course but it seems like it could end up declining significantly if it doesn't improve in a big way soon.

After all these years I was starting to wonder if COD was just immune to backlash, after multiple disliked entries like Infinite Warfare, MW3 2023, and Vanguard still sold gangbusters.

Seems the series isn't quite bulletproof after all.

Honestly, I'm astonished that franchise fatigue didn't set in a long time ago, with annual releases since 2005.

It resisted that since quality wise it was pretty consistent till the past few years. Like after the backlash to Infinite Warfare COD WW2 came out and was received better and then a couple years later MW 2019 took the series to new heights but now the past 2/3 entries have been poorly received which would already be really bad by itself but at the same time Battlefield has seemingly managed to win over a lot of COD fans so its dominance of the FPS genre is genuinely at risk now.

The less it sells the better! But no, the PS versions of the last BO6 weren't that dominant globally (counting PC). Skipping Playstation would probably lead to many Playstation gamers playing it on another platform (millions already have access to other platforms, and a couple of million would buy one), but most would skip it and look for another game. Battlefield 6 for example would have benefitted from it and sold even more than it did.

BO7 without Playstation would have probably fell to around 60%-70 of what it'll end up selling.

I just watched this and found out, that back with the activision blizzard buy...
we learnt they spent over $1.8bn on 3 Call of Duty games, over their lifetimes.
(video below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p9xv_rYzpzk )

That means even back then, the avg. cost of production and support, for the games pushed the developement costs of each Call of Duty game into the $600m+ range. Toss in inflation, and maybe 100m in marketing (call of duty is one of the biggest marketed video games on the planet).... and these games are not cheap to make and sell.

I can't even imagine, investing that much into it.... Call of Duty sells alot, but it HAS too, with the costs linked to it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjTVs_E0oQI


Check out 16m 30s mark in the video.

https://www.thegamebusiness.com/p/call-of-duty-black-ops-7-european

According to GSD data, Black Ops 7 sales in Europe are down 63% from Battlefield 6's debut last month.

Yep.... sales of Call of Duty Black Ops 7 are 63% lower than Battlefield 6's across Europe.

Sales of also over 60% down, compared to last year's Black Ops 6. 

So Call of Duty isn't the "biggest" shooter, this year.... it got beat.


*edit: 
Also Europe, and England's numbers are very similar.  Same with Steam numbers.
Its enough to call it a trend (imo).  I would not be surprised, if this also means in the US, CoD is down by over 60% as well.

*edit2:
Next year, Call of Duty will be launching next to a new GTA.  Yeah.... maybe 2027 is the year they make a comeback? 
How long does it take to right a big ship, like the production line, that is Call of duty each year ?  Is 2027 far enough away, for them to put some more effort in there and hopefully earn back some goodwill and trust?

*edit3:

It's now sitting at "Mostly negative" opinion's about it, on Steam reviews.
It's also almost out of the top20 best sellers current list.

I wonder what Xbox leadership is thinking, 2years after spending over $70bn for ABK.

The PS5 version of blackops 7 has been discounted to £40 on Amazon, less than 2 weeks after launch. That's cheaper than two months of Gamepass ultimate.