Microsoft has revealed an interesting perspective when it comes to Call of Duty, and Nintendo, in their communications to the CMA from earlier this month.
In the document titled MICROSOFT’S RESPONSE TO THE CMA’S QUESTIONS AT THE REMEDIES HEARING, dated March 6, 2023, they discussed the matter of bringing Call of Duty to different platforms. When it came to Nintendo, they had this to say on page 7:
“Nor could the CMA reach such a conclusion, given that CoD is not available on Nintendo – the second largest provider of consoles – today. As the Provisional Findings acknowledge, console platforms offer different technical specifications and differentiated gaming propositions.
Nintendo’s success demonstrates conclusively that a console platform’s ability to compete effectively is not dependent on the ability to offer CoD to its customers. Rather, this is possible with a “differentiated offer”.
In any event, Microsoft has already reached an agreement to bring CoD to the Nintendo platform for 10 years as part of its strategy to make CoD as widely available as possible.”
So when we talk about the deal that Microsoft made to bring Call of Duty to Nintendo for ten years, people often say that this is an offer that they did not have to make to Nintendo. But we see that in the same way that they didn’t need to offer the same to cloud gaming providers like Nvidia.
In fact, another way of looking at it is that Nintendo themselves don’t need Call of Duty, and that has been demonstrably true. Call of Duty’s representation on Nintendo platforms has been scattered and inconsistent. Most Call of Duty games went to the Nintendo DS, and that is definitely a platform Call of Duty gamers associate with the franchise.
While there was a window for Call of Duty to be a presence on Nintendo consoles on the Wii and Wii U, ultimately it did not stick around. Many games would point to the technical requirements to bring modern Call of Duty games to Nintendo’s platforms but that doesn’t seem to be the major hurdle.
Really, the dilemma Nintendo always has is because they only make games on their platforms, all the third parties are essentially competing with Nintendo on their own battleground. It isn’t even that Nintendo fans would rather play Splatoon than Call of Duty, but that Nintendo’s overall range of unique IP are why those fans bought Nintendo, and they have to be convinced to play those third party games as well.
On Nintendo’s end, their seemingly confounding cycles of successes and failures in the gaming market seems to corroborate Microsoft’s statement. Third party games like Call of Duty, and for that matter, other annual standards like FIFA, NBA 2K, etc, are in the background of Nintendo’s business nowadays. It’s true that this didn’t used to be the case, and it doesn’t have to be, but that’s where Nintendo is right now.
Microsoft’s commitment for a decade of Call of Duty on Nintendo platforms could be a sea change, not just for Call of Duty or FPS games on Nintendo, but third party games in general. But of course we already know something radical will brew in the industry when Microsoft finishes its deal with Activision.
