With Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard King finally complete, attention is turning towards what that actually means for the future of its properties. Perhaps the biggest question of all is when Activision Blizzard games will begin to launch into Xbox Game Pass, and Xbox CEO Phil Spencer has poured cold water on the prospect of that happening this year.
Speaking on the most recent Official Xbox Podcast, Spencer was asked about when players might expect to see franchises like Call of Duty and Crash Bandicoot arrive on the subscription service. He began by referring back to Microsoft’s previous acquisition of Bethesda Softworks, which began adding games only a few weeks after closing. Spencer went on to say that the process is a little different this time around:
“The truth of the matter is with Activision Blizzard King that the regulatory process took so long and, frankly, there was a lot of uncertainty in that process up until a week before we closed — or the week of, when the CMA finally came down to their decision — that we weren’t able to get in and work … mostly with Activision Blizzard in this case on that back catalogue.”
Spencer went on to reference Activision mentioning a 2024 timeline for getting its games onto Game Pass, saying that “I think that’s accurate.” From there, he went on to dash hopes of a surprise drop:
“I would love it if there was some kind of secret celebration drop that’s coming in the next couple of weeks. There’s not. Definitely when we think about the new games that are there, I would be straight with people. If we were going to put them into subscription this year, I would tell people.
“I know there will be some disappointment about that,” he went on. “This acquisition is definitely long term, so the fact that we’re not ending day one with a bunch of games dropping into Game Pass is a little bit of a downer, but I’m very excited about the future, and I just want to be straight with people.”
Elsewhere in the interview, he talked about the possibility of bringing back classic Activision franchises like Hexen, saying that while he would support that, those projects would have to be led by interested teams, rather than taking a top-down approach to mandate that. You can hear all of that and much more in the full interview:
