Microsoft and Nintendo just signed a 10-year agreement to bring Call of Duty to Nintendo, as soon as the acquisition of Activision Blizzard is finalized.
We all know that Microsoft wants to buy Activision Blizzard and the deal is still being reviewed by the FTC and regulators in Europe and the UK. The big point of contention is the Call of Duty franchise, among others, as Sony fears that Microsoft will make the game exclusive and PlayStation could lose a lot of players that way.
However, Microsoft and specifically Xbox boss Phil Spencer have already confirmed several times that they do not plan to release Call of Duty exclusively for Xbox and PC. They assured that CoD will continue to be released for the PlayStation.
With their latest announcement, they confirmed once again that Call of Duty will continue to be accessible to as many players as possible – in fact, even more players than before.
Will Call of Duty Come To Switch?
Vice Chair and President of Microsoft Brad Smith just announced that Microsoft and Nintendo negotiated and signed a binding 10-year legal agreement to bring Call of Duty to Nintendo players.
We've now signed a binding 10-year contract to bring Xbox games to Nintendo's gamers. This is just part of our commitment to bring Xbox games and Activision titles like Call of Duty to more players on more platforms. pic.twitter.com/JmO0hzw1BO
— Brad Smith (@BradSmi) February 21, 2023
The agreement promises full feature and content parity and a release for Nintendo consoles on day one.
Xbox boss Phil Spencer already announced this agreement back in December 2022 and Brad Smith reiterated that the Activision Blizzard acquisition was good for competition and consumers, i.e. gamers. He also stated that they're willing to offer Sony a similar 10-year agreement as well, should they agree to negotiate.
Since the acquisition has been under review for such a long time already, and it's still not clear whether it will go through, it seems Microsoft is now looking for ways to convince the regulators and also Sony that they don't want to build a monopoly. Bringing Call of Duty to the Switch and/or later Nintendo consoles would definitely be a big step, since the last time CoD was playable on a Nintendo console was in 2013 with CoD: Ghosts.
We think it would be great if Call of Duty was made available to even more players. After all, by adding Nintendo, they would have more or less covered the entire market. CoD has been available on Xbox, PlayStation, PC and even mobile for quite some time now. Also, Warzone Mobile will release sometime this year as well.
The big question, of course, is whether the Activision Blizzard acquisition will actually happen, and if it does, how the hell Call of Duty is going to run on a Switch...