Microsoft claims PS5 would lose 3% of players if Call of Duty was Xbox exclusive
Here we go again.
While Xbox continues to try to push through its purchase of gaming giant Activision Blizzard, the drama amplifies by the day, with PlayStation keeping up its attempts to keep the deal from finalising. Citing the potential monopolisation of the industry (even in spite of buying Bungie and reportedly considering buying Take-Two Interactive), there are concerns that Xbox will have bought the gaming world into a corner - and that would be a fair presumption if it weren't for Xbox's consistent promises that Call of Duty won't be made into a console exclusive.
And now, they've had to make the fact clear all over again.
Microsoft says it would make 'zero business sense' to make Call of Duty exclusive
Click to enlargeIn yet another admission that Xbox has no plans to box PlayStation fans out of the future of Call of Duty, a new Microsoft survey has revealed how pointless it would be for the company to make the franchise a console exclusive.
The company has disclosed the results of a January survey to Axios, which has revealed that YouGov discovered that only 3% of PlayStation users would migrate to Xbox if they made Call of Duty an exclusive series.
It's a pretty slim margin of players who would jump ship, and while it would amount to plenty in console sales, it wouldn't do nearly enough to help to recoup the costs of buying the company in the first place.
Microsoft doubles down on Call of Duty claims
After sharing this survey, Microsoft has once again made it as clear as they can that they don't intend to make Call of Duty an exclusive series.
"As we have said all along: it makes zero business sense to take Call of Duty off of PlayStation," they say, adding that the number of people switching from PlayStation to Xbox would be "too small to hurt Sony’s ability to compete and too small to make a withholding strategy profitable for Xbox."
They've said it far too much for it to have any sting anymore, but at least Xbox is making it clear once again that that it doesn't want to box PlayStation out. Can we please move on now, guys?