One of the key’s to Call of Duty’s success is something most gamers might take for granted, and some fans might consider a positive. Keeping new Call of Duty games available to at least the previous console generation does mean that these games can get more buyers, but it also means there are more players, and that includes people who are still on older consoles for various reasons.
Some fans would argue that this choice theoretically holds the games back, because Activision has to make more versions of the games. To the studio’s credit, they have ramped up their developer numbers accordingly to accommodate the higher workload that’s needed to keep the support to multiple consoles going. But now, there seems to finally be a good reason to drop eight generation console support.
CharlieIntel shared this information on Twitter:
“Call of Duty 2025 could still release on PS4 and Xbox One, per sources. Supporting last-gen in 2025 is a wild decision, but the game is in development for the old consoles from what we’ve heard.
This may be a reason as to why there can’t be two big maps in Warzone at same time.”
As Dexerto explained in their article, Call of Duty Warzone players are frustrated that they can’t play on two maps at one time. This arrangement makes it necessary to remove Avalon so that Activision can bring back Verdansk, and show that they have improved it to meet player’s expectations.
So this issue isn’t about making games that have to run on both eight generation and ninth generation consoles. To be fair to Activision, throughout most of the ninth generation, we have seen plenty of titles that were designed in such a way that they could be downported to eight generation consoles.
The reasons for these are surprisingly numerous. Most gamers may remember that the lockdown and quarantine period of the pandemic constrained supplies of PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S. That situation got so serious that developers were forced to backport their newer games to PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.
But that’s not the only reason. The rise of Fortnite, Minecraft, Overwatch 2, and others demonstrated that there was a big market in multiplayer multiplatform games, where the more platforms you could add in and support, the better.
Of course, there is also the argument that each console generation is providing diminishing returns, as the bar for technology means the default for graphics keeps getting higher and higher. It’s true that there are some games that are only possible in the newest generation of consoles because of their scope and ambition, such as Starfield.
But the big money remains in Call of Duty, and their strategy to prioritize the community over the franchise’s technical potential continues to pay off, after three generations of consoles. We think Call of Duty Warzone players will eventually get their way, but they’ll have to wait for the launch of the tenth generation of consoles (after the Switch 2) before it happens.
