Recent reports about future plans for the development of the Call of Duty franchise are not to be believed, Activision has announced.
The rumors began when an ex-Activision employee supposedly told Next-Gen that Infinity Ward, the developer of the wildly popular Call of Duty 4, had negotiated with Activision to be exclusive developer for the franchise after the next installment. The current arrangement is for Infinity Ward to alternate development of Call of Duty titles with Treyarch, which designed CoD3 and is working on CoD 5.
Activision's Maryanne Lataif has stepped forward to call the reports of Infinity Ward's new deal "erroneous information regarding the CoD franchise."
Last December, Activision CEO Bobby Kotick announced his company's plans to "exploit" its most successful franchises by releasing a new title every year. Granting exclusive rights to Infinity Ward, or any other developer, would make it far more difficult for Activision to get its yearly Call of Duty fix.
Adding fuel to the rumors was the announcement that the Activision Underground studio was closing. According to the same anonymous source, Underground had been working on two games: a port of *Quake Wars *and a third-person action Call of Duty spin-off.
Infinity Ward's exclusive development deal would have nixed that project, and led to the closure of the studio, according to the insider. It's a logical argument, unless Lataif is correct and there is no Call of Duty exclusivity in place.
All of which leaves us pretty much back where we started. What we know for certain is that Activision Underground will be completely shut down by the end of May, and that Treyarch is developing Call of Duty 5.
See Also:
- Call of Duty, Guitar Hero Titles to Be Cranked Out Yearly
- Call of Duty 4 Sees 1.3 Million Daily Online Gamers
- European CoD4 Map Bumped Forward
Activision Shoots Down CoD Rumors [Next Gen]
