Xbox blames Sony for keeping Call of Duty away from Game Pass

Xbox asserts that PlayStation has long prevented Call of Duty from being available through Xbox Game Pass. The approximately $70 billion acquisition of Activision by Microsoft has caused a lot…

By Pavan Gunagi

October 23, 2022

2 min read

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Xbox asserts that PlayStation has long prevented Call of Duty from being available through Xbox Game Pass. The approximately $70 billion acquisition of Activision by Microsoft has caused a lot of confusion. The tech behemoth said earlier this year that it plans to buy the major gaming publisher, giving Xbox complete control over games like Call of Duty, Overwatch, World of Warcraft, and others.

Although some regulators have already given their approval for the acquisition, Sony has chosen to make the strongest possible effort to persuade the remaining ones. Call of Duty may become an Xbox exclusive after the merger concludes, according to Sony, who expressed their worries about it earlier this year.

In response to these worries, Phil Spencer of Xbox noted that the company would approach Call of Duty similarly to Minecraft, a series that has received ongoing support on PlayStation.

After several points were made about how Microsoft’s Activision merger may harm the industry because of how it might use tools like exclusives, Microsoft has responded. The tech behemoth returned to the well-known topic of “blocking rights,” which involves a firm paying a developer to prevent the developer from putting their game on another platform or service.

Microsoft is now asserting that the Call of Duty franchise cannot be added to Xbox Game Pass because of PlayStation’s current marketing agreement with Activision for the shooter series. This isn’t much of a surprise given that there hasn’t yet been a Call of Duty game on Xbox Game Pass, but Microsoft is using it to counteract Sony’s complaints and concerns with the Microsoft and Activision partnership.

We kinda knew this already, but Microsoft makes it clear that Sony's deal for Call of Duty includes "restrictions on the ability of Activision Blizzard to place Call of Duty titles on Game Pass for a number of years." https://t.co/BfdfbE1Ae7 pic.twitter.com/37nEXYjfuj
— Tom Warren (@tomwarren) October 18, 2022

It is yet unknown whether this will affect how regulators view this deal. If the acquisition is approved, Microsoft has already stated that it will uphold PlayStation’s contract with Call of Duty. The agreement is anticipated to run until 2024 or 2025, which may prevent Microsoft from immediately adding the upcoming Call of Duty games to Xbox Game Pass.

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