[STEAM] Imminent removal of CoD from Game Pass will show ‘cracks’ in Microsoft’s gaming strategy, leaker suggests

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Call of Duty, undoubtedly Activision's biggest franchise, has been part of Game Pass' Day One program since 2024. Two titles so far were available on release for Game Pass subscribers, but that could soon be wrapped up, according to Jez Corden.

Corden, a reliable leaker of all things

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,

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last night that CoD could soon be taken out of Game Pass' Day One program, which'd make the franchise no longer available for subscribers on release. Being such a massive franchise, this would surely have a massive impact on the viability of higher Game Pass tiers, behind which Day One is currently locked.

And Corden seems to think as much, saying "cracks" will inevitably start to show in

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's gaming strategy if Call of Duty is taken out of Xbox Game Pass, which is becoming more and more certain as time goes by.

"If [

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takes] Call of Duty out of Game Pass this year, which is a possibility from what I've heard, I think it'll reveal some of the cracks in [its] strategy," Corden said.

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In response to a viewer commenting on the decline of

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's gaming revenue, Corden said that "revenue is down because Call of Duty is down," which isn't only due to its availability on Game Pass but also its overall decline in quality and the rise of alternatives like Battlefield 6 that far outshone Activision's established, formulaic franchise.

By removing CoD from Game Pass,

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stands to "motivate" eager players to purchase the game instead, at no less than $70, potentially boosting the company's gaming revenue at least during the peak of CoD sales around launch. Offering it on Game Pass on release day inevitably weakens the franchise's strongest moment, so I could see the logic behind such a move.

Nothing official has yet been published by either

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or its subsidiary, Activision, so take all of this with a grain of salt. Game Pass has been shown, time and again, to

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, especially if a title is part of the Day One program or comes to Game Pass shortly after launch. Players are apparently ready to wait for a week or two to get the game via subscription rather than to buy into it immediately, severely hampering sales and player counts.

The Outer Worlds 2 is a recent AAA example, as that game failed to reach any meaningful numbers on Steam, despite high reviews from critics and players alike, since it was available via Game Pass.

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