Activision’s CEO explains reasonings behind partnership with Microsoft for Call of Duty DLC

Ever since Activision and Microsoft struck a deal in 2010 regarding Call of Duty DLC to come first to the Xbox 360 gamers, there has been lots of controversy as to why Activision actually reached this agreement for the biggest entertainment franchise ever. At Xbox Reveal event, Activision confirmed that all Call of Duty: Ghosts DLC will be coming first to Xbox One.

Eric Hirshberg spoke to IGN at E3, and explained why they have this deal with Microsoft.

“It helps us launch the games. It helps us amplify our marketing messages and get the word out to a larger audience,” Hirshberg explained. “Getting the first parties to participate in that process is very helpful. Us giving them some meaningful exclusive content or time advantages for their platform helps them have something to market to their community as well. It’s a mutually beneficial relationship in both of the cases that you mentioned. But it’s important to note that they’re not exclusive relationships. Activision has historically been a platform agnostic company.”

Activision CEO continued:

“As much as I’m sure the first parties would love to have some of our games exclusively, we want to be wherever gamers are,” he continued. “We try to strike the right balance between giving something meaningful to the first parties for them to market to their community, and for them to reward their community for their loyalty, but something that also allows us to continue to flourish on all the platforms. We’ve struck the right balance, because Call of Duty is equally popular on PlayStation as it is on Xbox. We hope Destiny is the same.”

Call of Duty: Ghosts launches November 5th on XBox 360, PS3, and PC. It’s coming soon to PS4 and Xbox One.

SOURCE: IGN