Bobby Kotick, as any self-respecting gamer will tell you, is one of the most hated men in the industry. In fact, upon typing Bobby Kotick into the Google search bar, the second most popular phrase to appear reads “Bobby Kotick is the devil”. Aside from having numerous adoring fans, Bobby Kotick also holds the CEO position at Activision Blizzard. As thus, he recently had some very interesting words to say concerning Call of Duty and subscription fees to the Wall Street Journal.
In the online version of the Wall Street Journal, Kotick was asked, “If you could snap your fingers, and instantly make one change in your company, what would it be, and why? “. Kotick answered “I would have Call of Duty be an online subscription service tomorrow.” In the interview, he goes on to state things like “I would love to see us have an online Call of Duty world” and “I think our players would have so much more of a compelling experience.”
So is Bobby Kotick saying that a more compelling game experience is equivalent to paying more money? Yes, and he’s barely even ashamed about it. Really, it’s not difficult to see why so many gamers hate Kotick, especially when he says things like, “The goal that I had in bringing a lot of the packaged goods folks into Activision about 10 years ago was to take all the fun out of making video games.” However, the interview does raise some interesting questions.
Would an “online Call of Duty world” be entertaining? What does Kotick even mean by “online Call of Duty world”? Would gamers willingly pay a fee to participate in the aforementioned world? Unfortunately, if one were to be realistic, the answers to all those questions are probably not very positive.
