The coronavirus global pandemic might have hit Activision Blizzard hard.

We previously wrote about how this year’s Call of Duty could be set in or around the second world war. Sledgehammer Games is to take the lead developer role, and with it, 2022 might see the first next-gen only (PlayStation 5/Xbox Series) title in the series with the new Black Ops. But before that, we go back to the past, maybe. Tom Henderson, who previously talked a lot about the next Battlefield (which we call Battlefield 6 for now), wrote the following on Twitter on April 7: „Vanguard… To put it simply is a f___ing disaster. But more on that at a later time.”

He thinks the PlayStation 4 and the Xbox One hold back the next game so badly, and since the publisher aims to get even more money (even via predatory microtransactions), Bobby Kotick, the CEO who recently got a 200-million bonus, wouldn’t let the PlayStation 4 player base (110+ million players) behind so easily. Henderson doesn’t rule out that the publisher might skip this year’s annual release to go with the B plan, which could be a cancellation.

„Call of Duty 2021 possibly cancelled. I tweeted about this yesterday but took it down, as I didn’t have 100% proof, now I do. Sledgehammer Games might be back to being a “Support Studio”. It also says Modern Warfare 2 multiplayer remastered will release this fall with Modern Warfare/Warzone/Black Ops Cold War content continuing throughout 2022,” another leaker, Zesty, wrote on April 27. However, CharlieINTEL quickly responded: „A lot of rumours going around about Call of Duty 2021 last few days based off of a 4Chan post. The user who posted said he “made up” his info and “didn’t expect” people to believe him.” Then, Henderson joined in: „It would appear that the Discord DMCA takedown from @thesoapkai is a legitimate takedown from Activision. However, this does not confirm or deny anything. Activision tends to issue DMCA’s falsely and IMO, we should have seen more DMCA’s issued to people covering it.” It, as in the rumours about the next game.

Still, if there are rumours of development going bad, then Activision Blizzard might indeed pull out 2009’s Call of Duty’s re-released multiplayer to get things straight for next year. However, nothing is official yet.

Source: PSL