Activision Blizzard's popular Call of Duty franchise has earned over $3 billion in the last year. The publisher, which released Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War on November 13, says that net bookings, which take into account the net number of products and services sold digitally or physically, as well as license fees, merchandise, and publisher incentives, serve to measure the revenue earned by the franchise.
The profits generated by Call of Duty aren’t all that surprising considering the franchise is the best-selling first-person shooter game series of all time, according to the Guinness World Records, and the third highest-grossing game franchise of all time. However, this year, the franchise's net bookings increased 80%, with units sold growing 40%. As of 2020, more than 200 million people have played one of the franchise’s games, according to Activision.
Call of Duty: Warzone, the free-to-play battle royale game released last March, has had a player count of over 85 million since its launch, which has afforded the franchise its largest ever player count on console and PC. The success of the franchise was also complemented by Call of Duty Mobile, which has had more than 300 million downloads since it was released on October 1, 2019.
Activision is confident that "this is only the beginning" and the franchise will continue to grow. "Additional free, post-release content for all Black Ops Cold War players is on the way as new seasons of content will continue to add and transform both the scope and scale of gameplay, with Season One set to debut this month," the company said.
The success of Call of Duty is partly due to its following among esports fans. The game, which is most popular in Europe and North America, with users participating in tournaments and ladder matches daily, attracts countless viewers. On average, competitive Call of Duty players boast roughly 500,000 followers on social media.
One setback for Call of Duty, however, has been its planned live action film, which was announced in 2018. Filming on the first installment was due to begin last year for a 2020 or 2021 release, yet in February, Activision announced that production had been put on hold indefinitely.
Source: IGN