There’s some rumors and mixed signals going around about Call of Duty and Nintendo.
As reported by GoNintendo, the official Call of Duty Twitter account from Brazil started following some Brazilian Nintendo YouTubers on Twitter. This happened a few hours after Nintendo confirmed that they would be holding both an Indie World Partner Showcase and a Nintendo Direct Partner Showcase later today. This has led to speculation that there will be a Call of Duty related announcement on these events.
Now, we should review the facts on this as we know them. Activision has not published a new Call of Duty game on a Nintendo platform since Call of Duty: Ghosts, for the Wii U last 2013. Last February of 2023, Microsoft signed a deal with Nintendo so that Call of Duty games would come to Nintendo platforms for ten years. This deal was made before Microsoft finalized their deal to acquire Activision, but since that also came to pass, they now have to make good on the deal.
So, we don’t know the provisions of said deal. But we know that Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III, the first Call of Duty game published by Microsoft as Activision’s new owner, did not come to the Nintendo Switch. This may seem like a violation of the terms of the deal, but again, since the contract’s details were not made public, we don’t know that that was the case.
Since then, there’s been a lot of speculation on how Microsoft would fulfill this deal with Nintendo. There was a lot of FUD that the Switch would get poorer versions of the Call of Duty games, mirroring how they had smaller or lesser versions of those games on platforms like the Wii and Nintendo DS. There is also speculation that rather than try to bring ports of the latest annualized games, Activision and Microsoft could have prepared ports of some classic Call of Duty games. There’s no factual basis for this, but it would be a logical move. Nintendo fans have proven they are eager to buy multiplatform games, even old ones that have been republished on other platforms multiple times.
There was also speculation that the first Call of Duty games would not come until the launch of Nintendo’s next console. Rumors and speculation around that console, which leakers and fans have dubbed the Switch 2, is that it will have power equal or at least comparable to the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. Fans would naturally want to see this come to pass more, because Call of Duty games are still regularly developed and published for those consoles.
There’s only one problem with this rumor. As shared on the GamingLeaksAndRumours subreddit by user Fragrant_Okra6671, the aforementioned official Call of Duty Twitter account from Brazil deleted their responses to tweets about the Nintendo Direct. They still follow those YouTubers on the social network. So, even that very faint suggestion that we could get some sort of news or announcement has been partly taken back.
We do know that Microsoft is contractually obligated to bring Call of Duty to Nintendo platforms. We just don’t know the exact circumstances that it will happen. Once it does, it will become just another valuable money pouch that Microsoft adds to the already incredible wealth generator that is the Call of Duty franchise. But if Activision and Microsoft can pull off cross-platform play between Nintendo’s platforms and everyone else, the potential is high that they will get whales double dipping and even triple dipping on Call of Duty games, just to get that extra portable experience.
