Lots Of Activision Blizzard Games Aren't On Xbox Game Pass Yet, But Why?

Growing up my parents didn't let me play CoD games, or any realistic/war fps, so the first CoD that I played was WWII. I'd love to go back and play the original Moder Warfare trilogy, the Black Ops games, even the Advance/Infinite warfare games, but CoD games are expensive and when they go on sale it's not by much, so I'll love for them to be on Game Pass

I could have sworn getting the Activision back catalogue on Gamepass was one of the (several) stated reasons for trying to buy Activision.

Honest answer? They still sell well, especially CoD, and adding them to gamepass would impact those sales.

They have a load of games they could add today if they wanted they just want to milk as much money out of the games before they do look at the big call of duty sales right now it's a joke!!

I hope we get the older CoDs on gamepass, would be fun to play the campaigns again! but as stated above, they still sell copies so...

I really couldn't care less. I have no desire to play any old Activision titles at all.
For those that do, I hope you get what you want sooner rather than later!

Xbox should had went after blizzard then Ubisoft

I'd love to see Hearthstone added to Gamepass.

Do they own sekiro?

@Beetlebum91 I think they just published that game.
From software might own the IP.

Bearing in mind how lean some of the months have been for the past year or so, I find it amazing that Microsoft haven't thrown out a bone or two here and there. Even smaller or older games just to pad things out. Microsoft have either just about given up on the Service, or they are flat out incompetent or complacent...

@themightyant that was the issue with all the hype from the players and those in favour - this was never about getting all those games on gamepass. This was about candy crush income and COD income. The income streams are huge. Gamers decided they were gonna reap rewards and I genuinely never saw any evidence that was promised.

@Ricky-Spanish @themightyant thanks!

The Game Pass Ultimate already has what? 800 games or so? No one can play all of this in his lifetime and I don't believe, that maybe more than 10 people care about playing the old CoD games online today.
And of course, Microsoft won't want to put all their stuff inside immediately.
It's like the garbage Switch Online content, where month after month after month Nintendo puts in very old games and people are actually happy for it and are again paying for another year of overpriced online gaming.
Bit for bit, feed the people so they think this subscription is a good deal. 👍🏼

I also don't get why some people are paying monthly for playing games like Diablo 4 or Persona 5 instead of just buying these games, which would be a way better deal. 😂

I’d like all the CoDs Xbox One era onwards. Not bothered about the XB360 ones, unless they can give them a resolution bump.

It probably isn't a good strategy to just drop everything in at once even if it was possible. Dropping that many big games would eat into anything else releasing around it. A slow drip is better (they seem to be at or around 1 game per month).

They probably learned a lot from the data after the bethesda drop. I imagine there were plenty of games in that drop that attracted very few players because people went straight to the big ones. They would have gotten more out each game if they spaced out the releases.

The classic COD games in game pass presents its own problem too unless it is a single collection and/or rolled into the current Duty app. They don't want the current COD community to break up into like a dozen different games. It would be a mess as a consumer too to keep track of which ones your squad wants to play or which ones have the most players. Downloading all my favorite cod games and managing those installs sounds like a nightmare.

They are using ABK catalogue to fill in the gaps basically. So at some quet month they can drop some older COD games.

Honestly we as xboxers did not get much from ABK deal aside from COD on GP (Thats huge though). Moreover, this deal basically forced the whole gaming devision to change strategy so in hindsight I actually regret wanting this deal at all.

@Nintendo4Sonic everyone is concerned because during ABk deal they were mentioning adding all these games into service.
On top of that the moment Zenimax was acquired we have seen ALL games dropped to service right away.

Things changed and now they are sneakier and greedier than before I say

All I want is the Legend of Spyro Dawn of the Dragon. That is all. Well that's a lie. I also want the Cybertron games and Web of Shadows and Marvel Ultimate Alliance and Edge of Time and Shattered Dimensions and the Platinum Games Legend of Korra and Transformers games... of course all of those are delisted and all but Spyro licensed so...

I think the real issue here is that Activision Blizzard barely even makes games anymore. There's the yearly COD and then most everything else is ongoing live service. Most of the standalone single player games are Xbox 360/early Xbox One era. Some of them they can add easily like Prototype, but a lot were licensed and are now delisted. There's a massive backlog of COD but they seem kinda confused what to do with all of them. Who really knows?

At least now Xbox has cemented ABK's inclusion in the Xbox ecosystem. New games are releasing day one on Game Pass and now even with Xbox Play Anywhere support (as in a game like the upcoming Tony Hawk promises that if you buy it on Battle Net you'll have it on the Xbox PC app and Xbox consoles; it is also a day one game pass game). That's nice. New releases are starting to feel like first party game releases in terms of available features.

And games like Call of Duty will detract from the 'latest' Call of Duty where they have an active store full of active Cosmetics, Active Seasonal content and Battle Passes - all of which they want to 'sell'.

Since they changed to the Battle Pass system and ditched the DLC Map Packs, there is also a LOT of Cosmetic content that is NOT available. They don't have the 'seasonal' content, events, rewards etc. DMZ for example had seasonal 'progression' as it evolved - but now is left as it ended and all those 'limited' time modes/events like Halloween, won't be available.

Other games - like James Bond, Spider-Man etc are Licenced games which adds additional complexity - ABK (and now Microsoft) may own the Publishing rights etc but the don't own the IP's - they don't own them to update and/or release on Game Pass.

You can still buy old 360 era CoD games on Xbox - in fact they had a sale on them, but I don't know if they'll release on Game Pass when its 'competing' with their latest (also in Game Pass) and 'unlikely' to sell Subscriptions, Games or even DLC packs. If the 'latest' is in GP, that's the one GP users will 'play' and maybe be tempted to buy the new Seasonal Battle Pass or maybe a Cosmetic bundle or two. Adding a 'new' game, as opposed to games several years old or more, is also likely to sell more Subscriptions...

Never mind all the big fancy AAA games, where's 'Geometry Wars Retro Evolved 2: The Revival - Remastered, Revisited and Remixed Complete Edition'😁

Well this is weird… after posting about Geo Wars 2 I fancied playing it, but it’s no longer working 🤔

Project Gotham Racing series was developed by Bizarre Creations (Activision) and published by Microsoft Game Studios. - Please bring back Project Gotham Racing 1-4 / Blur and hire former employees of Bizarre Creations; - Lucid Games Ltd. to do a remake or remaster of Project Gotham Racing 4.

It's ridiculous that have actually released as few as they have so far. There are so many games if they released a couple every month I would be ok with that but NO.

I call ***** on this one.
Okay, if there are some problems with licensing, deal with those problems. But I doubt there are any problems with releasing Modern Warfare 2 (new one) or even Vanguard or Black ops Cold War on Game Pass. They are modern games and I doubt there are any problems with licensing.

I just think they are not bringing them to Game Pass, because Black Ops 6 is their moneymaker and they are afraid that people will back to the games that can't be monetised that well.

@Vrikkegutt Oh yeah, we could do with good arcade racer.

Crash 4 for today. I'm setting my expectations right here.

Yeah, greed is very complicated...

@Godot25 thats probably the reason but the active battle pass is only in the latest COD. So active peoples who donate and play cod are always on the latest one anywyas.

I dont think MW1-2 or cold war will cannibalize any sales.
And same goes for older cod games, they are on sale for $10-20 anyways.
I feel like its just greedy tactics because apparently things are different now and they are not trying to win people with GP. Its the service they do since they commited to but they dont believe in it anymore

@BAMozzy I personally believe GP is not a priority anymore. They kinda gave up on the service becoming that big and mainstream as netflix so now its a service they must continue with because they committed to it.
So if they can stretch adding games into service and keep selling games - they will do it.
Its same people paying for GP mostly, aside from recent spike on PC due to COD.
So instead of winning new audience they decided to milk the existing one hence the price hikes, conversion nerfs and pushing day 1 into GPU.

Singularity
prototype

@Millionski I disagree - Game Pass is their 'main' platform that is on Console, PC and Internet/Wifi enabled devices. Its their way to get people into their ecosystem - especially on PC/Mobile where they compete with Steam, Epic and all the other vendors/platforms.

Game Pass isn't 'just' about playing the Library of games inc Xbox games Day 1. It also offers Streaming and of course extra Discounts on Games and DLC too - but only from the Xbox/Windows store. They are also expanding on the 'Cloud' side so its not just the selection of games in the Game Pass Library you can stream, but also games you can now buy (or if you own) and can now stream - but only if you bought from MS.

Game Pass is important to MS as that will bring people into 'Xbox' more than a Console will. People without Consoles, maybe casual /budget limited gamers who play through their TV or Mobile will sub to GP and then 'upgrade' to an Xbox. With technology advancing and 'Gaming' PC's now able to be built into 'Handheld Console' like devices, Game Pass is 'important' for MS to compete with Steam, Epic and all the other PC game providers - MS get most money from selling their games through their store and in their ecosystem - so it makes a difference to MS 'where' people play and/or where they buy their MS games.

That is why MS will likely continue to release their games into Game Pass and their own Console first for the 'majority' of their releases that will release on Playstation (or Switch). Obviously some - like CoD, Minecraft and Doom will be 'day 1' multi-platform releases, the rest will be 'exclusive' to Xbox - whether for months or years. They'll want to 'encourage' gamers to sign up to Game Pass on whatever platform they have, buy an Xbox to play or preferably buy the game through Xbox/Windows store as they'll get more money. Their PC releases are 'Windows' based - not really optimised for Steam/Steamdeck so with PC handhelds, they'll hope you buy from MS or at least sign up to Game Pass.

MS stopped the focus on Console to bring people into their Ecosystem and Game Pass, along with Direct Storage/Play Anywhere is their Primary platform. It has Rewards too and points for playing Game Pass on PC, Cloud and Console daily. It links across ALL devices and PC Game Pass CoD gamers are in the Console' only players - same as Palworld where the 'cross-play' is only between PC Game Pass (not Steam) and Xbox Consoles because its seen as the same 'platform'.

Price Hikes are more to do with the state of the industry - in case you hadn't noticed, prices have risen and sales aren't growing - hence we had so many 'restructuring' and closures. Its not just the 70bn they spent for ABK, but trying to keep offering Day 1 releases of AAA budget games - and also seem to be much more able to offer at least 1 a quarter, something they weren't doing before the price hike. We've had Avowed already, Indy a few months ago, have South of Midnight and Doom coming - let alone 3rd Party releases too. Almost every Show these days has 'coming to Game Pass' or the Game Pass icon included as a release 'platform'...