Video games have become so costly to make that a major title release is a potential extinction event for some developers. Understandably, they prefer to play it safe by identifying that which sells and expressing their creativity in very similar, ideally cheaper, ways. In other words, the dream project of an average game developer would be to release the same popular game over and over again. Of course, in some cases, this ‘dream project’ is ‘an actual business model‘.
As much fun as Call of Duty jokes are though, the practice of releasing very similar looking sequels has existed since the dawn of video game classics like Doom and Fallout. No one likes to have all of their original work go unmilked if they can help it. However, as the required yield of delicious green dairy has increased from thousands to millions, the recycling has become increasingly excessive. It is now unusual NOT to see whole trilogies looking and feeling like three levels of the same game. Yet, somehow, game publishers are able to convince us that every one of those entries is fresh enough to buy. When the original has enough obvious flaws to be fixed then this task is easy but what if it does not? What if the first title is not Assassin’s Creed but Bioshock? Well, then game creators have to get very creative… or:
We have many great Call of Duty games with bad Campaigns in the series and Call of Duty 2025 could very well become one of them.
More hyped for CoD 2026.
IW's at helm. Supposedly doing an engine evolution similar to MW'19. Evident by the current-gen only rumors.
I uninstalled cod24 the campaign was just cobbled together that dream state you go in and then there's that boss that throws gunk at you. How can you have boss fight in a cod
EA just hosted its quarterly financial conference call, and its executives have been asked to comment about the recent price hikes for games.
Today, Electronic Arts announced its financial results for the fourth quarter of its fiscal year 2025, alongside the full year.
Split Fiction has sold nearly 4 million copies, and the next battlefield is confirmed for a release by March 2026 with a reveal this Summer.
Good article, most of them true; especially multilplayer. I don't understand why now every game has to have it. I never get why every industry follows what is successful and tries to copy it, instead of innovate and make something successful for themselves. That's why we now have countless military shooters (and shooters in general). I bet that if someone releases a chess game that sells 12 million, we will have every developer implementing chess in every game...
The worst problem is that if successful game sells 10 million (say it's outstandingly a lot), then every other developer and publisher wants to sell the same amount, and if their game sells 1 million less, they consider it a failure! (same goes for movies and tv shows).
What happened to the times where a developer wanted to make a game because it was a great idea, or because it raised the bar in story telling, technology, AI, etc? I can imagine that now, publishers green light games on the potential to sell the same amount as COD.
It's a shame
Great point about 'just add snow', lol. Gears of War 2 was another one.
Bring it to consoles as a FPS and ruin it .. Classic method.
I like how the examples listed for shoehorning multiplayer are games I've only heard good things about in regards to the multiplayer. Just because it isn't need doesn't mean it devalues the game to include it.
Thanks for reading everyone and thanks to Boysangur for submitting and thanks to the brass for approving.