Sony believes Call of Duty might encourage customers to modify to Xbox following Microsoft’s proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard.

That’s in response to the corporate’s official response to questions from Brazil’s regulatory physique (first noticed by Resetera), which like many areas, is at present finding out the proposed deal for approval.

Together with different firms equivalent to Ubisoft, Amazon and Google, Sony’s responses to a number of questions in regards to the proposed acquisition have been printed in full by the Brazilian authorities.

Sony’s response – learn by VGC – largely outlines the present state of triple-A recreation improvement for the Brazilian regulator. Nonetheless, massive parts spotlight the significance the PlayStation agency places on Call of Duty, a franchise which it claims “influences customers’ console alternative.”

In its questionnaire solutions, Sony calls Call of Duty “a necessary recreation: a blockbuster, an AAA-type recreation that has no rival.”

“In line with a 2019 examine, ‘The significance of Call of Duty to leisure, generally, is indescribable,’” the corporate stated. “The model was the one online game IP to interrupt into the highest 10 of all leisure manufacturers amongst followers, becoming a member of powerhouses equivalent to Star Wars, Recreation of Thrones, Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings.

“Call of Duty is so fashionable that it influences customers’ alternative of console, and its community of loyal customers is so entrenched that even when a competitor had the price range to develop the same product, it wouldn’t be capable to rival it.”

Sony went on to clarify how the large sources Activision places behind Call of Duty are the core cause why it believes the FPS collection is unlikely to be rivalled by a competitor.

“Every annual Call of Duty launch takes roughly 3-5 years to develop. As Activision releases one Call of Duty recreation per 12 months, this equates to an annual funding of tons of of thousands and thousands of {dollars},” it defined.

“Roughly 1,200 individuals work on every model and one other 1,500 are concerned in publishing and distribution. Thus, Call of Duty alone has extra builders than most recreation firms make use of throughout its whole improvement portfolio, even AAA studios.

“Additionally, given its plans to recruit 2,000 further builders by 2021, Activision in all probability expects Call of Duty to grow to be much more profitable sooner or later.

“No different developer can commit the identical stage of sources and experience in recreation improvement. Even when they might, Call of Duty is overly entrenched, in order that no rival – regardless of how related – can catch up.”

Sony went on to notice that Call of Duty has been the top-selling recreation for nearly yearly for the previous decade and, for its style, “is overwhelmingly the best-selling recreation”.

“It’s synonymous with first-person shooter video games and basically defines that class,” it stated. “That is additionally demonstrated by participant engagement on social media: Call of Duty has over 24 million followers on Fb versus 7 million for Battlefield; and over 12 million followers on Instagram versus 2 million for Battlefield.”

It added: “To say the least, gamers could be unlikely to modify to different video games, as they’d lose that familiarity, these expertise and even the buddies they made enjoying the sport.

“Even in weaker years like 2021, Call of Duty nonetheless managed to outperform most different video games by a substantial margin. Call of Duty: Vanguard (2021), for instance, was broadly thought to be weaker than earlier years’ titles, however was nonetheless one of the best-selling video games of 2021. In different phrases, even in a nasty 12 months, gamers stay loyal to the model and proceed to purchase the sport.”

In its first response to Microsoft’s proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard printed in January, Sony stated it expects Call of Duty video games to stay multiplatform as a consequence of “contractual agreements”.

Microsoft’s head of gaming additionally subsequently confirmed his intention to maintain Call of Duty on PlayStation platforms as soon as Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard is accomplished.

Nonetheless, it was later claimed that Activision Blizzard is contractually dedicated to releasing solely the subsequent three Call of Duty video games for PlayStation consoles, together with this 12 months’s Trendy Warfare 2.

The Call of Duty collection is frequently amongst PlayStation’s hottest video games. Final 12 months, the collection was each the primary (Vanguard) and third (Black Ops Chilly Battle) best-selling video games on PlayStation within the US, in response to NPD.