However, the latter serves as the MVP when it comes to overall hardware spending. At $248 million, it’s up 16 percent over the previous year, which was enough to offset declining sales for the PS5, Xbox Series X/S and Switch 1. The fact that it achieved this while ranking second in dollar and unit sales is equally impressive.

The only new game release was Bandai Namco’s Code Vein 2, which reached 11th in the overall charts. However, it topped the PC sales chart that considered all storefronts. Perhaps even more surprising is that Final Fantasy 7 Remake re-entered the top ten charts, going from 225th place in December 2025 to ninth, thanks to its Xbox Series X/S and Nintendo Switch 2 ports.

If that’s not a good sign that Square Enix made the right move to go multiplatform with the trilogy, we don’t know what is. The next entry, Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth, is out on June 3rd for both platforms.

The post is a the latest iteration of the Xbox Excellence Awards, which was created last year to celebrate how players engaged with various releases on Xbox. The Store Rating category lists 2025 games with the best ratings on the Microsoft Store, with an added requirement of the title having at least 500 ratings. Player Engagements is about the average number of hours spent on a game by each player within the first six weeks of a game’s release. Daily Active Users celebrates titles, expansions or updates with the highest single-day active users throughout the year. And finally Units Sold is fairly self-explanatory.

Going down the lists, you’ll find many of the biggest releases of the year, from ARC Raiders and Battlefield 6, as well as award-winning RPG Clair Obscur: Expedition 33. Indie titles have also been well-represented, with games like Crime Scene Cleaner and Satisfactory making it into the lists. There also doesn’t seem to have been a singular genre to dominate the lists, since everything from sports games like EA Sports Madden NFL 26, to fantasy adventure life sims like Fantasy Life i: The Girl Who Steals Time, and even fighting games like Marvel vs. Capcom Fighting Collection: Arcade Classics are well represented.

Curiously, none of the games was present in all four of the categories. At most, we got to see titles like Borderlands 4 being able to make it on to three of them: Player Engagement, Daily Active Users and Units Sold. Even ARC Raiders, which has seen quite a bit of success, is only on the Units Sold and Daily Active Users lists.

Microsoft has also emphasized that the lists represent a diverse collection of games developed by studios of varying sizes. All in all, it represents 48 unique developers based out of 13 countries, with 24 publishers having had a hand in their release. 19 of the games were self-published. “Taken as a whole, it’s an encapsulation of development on Xbox – we want gaming to reach you wherever you are, and for the teams making those games to find you from wherever they are,” wrote the company.

Full list of games:

Store Rating:

• Call of Duty: Black Ops 7
• Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
• Crime Scene Cleaner
• Demon Slayer -Kimetsu no Yaiba- The Hinokami Chronicles 2
• Digimon Story: Time Stranger
• Dreamcore
• Dynasty Warriors: Origins
• Fantasy Life i: The Girl Who Steals Time
• Final Fantasy XVI
• Lies of P: Overture
• Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii
• Little Nightmares III
• Marvel vs. Capcom Fighting Collection: Arcade Classics
• Minami Lane
• Mullet MadJack
• Poppy Playtime Chapter 4
• Satisfactory
• Silent Hill 2
• Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds
• The First Berserker: Khazan

Player Engagement:

• Borderlands 4
• Digimon Story: Time Stranger
• Dynasty Warriors: Origins
• EA Sports College Football 26
• EA Sports FC 26
• Elden Ring Nightreign
• Fantasy Life i: The Girl Who Steals Time
• Farm Together 2
• Final Fantasy Tactics – The Ivalice Chronicles
• Helldivers 2
• Inazuma Eleven: Victory Road
• Kingdom Come: Deliverance II
• Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii
• MLB The Show 25
• Monster Hunter Wilds
• NBA 2K26
• NHL 26
• Rust
• Satisfactory
• The First Berserker: Khazan

Daily Active Users:

• Arc Raiders
• Avowed
• Battlefield 6
• Borderlands 4
• Call of Duty: Black Ops 7
• DOOM: The Dark Ages
• Elden Ring Nightreign
• Fortnite
• Forza Horizon 5
• Grand Theft Auto V
• Grounded 2
• Helldivers 2
• Marvel Rivals
• Minecraft
• NBA 2K26
• Rematch
• Roblox
• Rocket League
• The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered
• Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Siege

Units Sold:

• Arc Raiders
• Assassin’s Creed Shadows
• Battlefield 6
• Borderlands 4
• Call of Duty: Black Ops 7
• EA Sports Madden NFL 26
• EA Sports College Football 26
• EA Sports FC 26
• Elden Ring Nightreign
• Grand Theft Auto V
• Helldivers 2
• Hollow Knight: Silksong
• Kingdom Come: Deliverance II
• MLB The Show 25
• Monster Hunter Wilds
• NBA 2K26
• PGA Tour 2K25
• Ready or Not
• The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered
• WWE 2K25

Taking a closer look at software sales for the month of December, Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 took the lead, with Battlefield 6 being ranked third. Other titles in the best-seller charts for the month are a mix of newer games like Donkey Kong Bananza and older titles like Grand Theft Auto 5, Minecraft and Red Dead Redemption 2.

While other console makers might have started struggling with console sales last year, Nintendo has been doing quite well with the release of the Switch 2. Piscatella had confirmed, the Switch 2 ended up being the best-selling console of the year in the US, with the country accounting for 4.4 million units. Along with this, the new console is also noted as selling faster than the original Switch from back in 2017.

As he noted, the Switch 2’s hardware sales single-handedly managed to offset industry-wide downward trends in console hardware sales. Sony’s PS5 ranked second for the period. The Switch 2 has also been described by Piscatella as being the “fastest selling video game console hardware platform” in history so far.

While things might be going well for Nintendo for the time being, research firm Niko Partners has predicted that the company will end up raising the price of the Switch 2 thanks to the worldwide memory shortages affecting manufacturing. The firm noted that, while the Switch 2 is priced competitively when compared to PS5 and Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo might have to bring its latest console in line with its competitors to maintain profitability.

In the meantime, Battlefield Studios has been working hard on creating and testing more content for the upcoming second season of Battlefield 6. While it hasn’t yet revealed too many details aside from its February 17 launch date, the developers provided a few hints about what kind of content we can expect when Season 2 of Battlefield 6 is kicked off.

Among the new content coming to the game is a brand new map, dubbed Contagion, that will also feature its own unique gameplay mechanics. No details have been provided about these mechanics, aside from vague hints about players needing to use equipment to interact with them, a soldier wearing a gas mask in the teaser trailer, and the fact that the map’s name implies some sort of contagious infection will be involved.

Battlefield 6 is available on PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X/S. For more details, check out our review from back when it first came out.

2025 Top 20 Best-Selling Premium Games – U.S. (Dollar Sales, Physical and Digital from digital data sharing publishers, excludes add-on content)

— Mat Piscatella (@matpiscatella.bsky.social) 2026-01-22T14:00:07.506Z

December 2025 Top 20 Best-Selling Premium Games – U.S. (Dollar Sales, Physical and Digital from digital data sharing publishers, excludes add-on content)

— Mat Piscatella (@matpiscatella.bsky.social) 2026-01-22T14:00:07.505Z

Why is that a problem? The Call of Duty App doesn’t just include Call of Duty: Black Ops 7, which launched last year to underwhelming reviews due to its campaign. It also tracks Black Ops 6, Warzone, the Modern Warfare series, and much more. Keep in mind that these player counts follow Holiday discounts and even a free week. The sad part is that this isn’t even the lowest in the past week, as it reached 39,015 peak concurrent players on January 8th.

Of course, none of this changes the fact that Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 topped last November’s US sales charts (even if Battlefield 6 emerged as the top-selling premium game of 2026). Engagement with the app on consoles in the region was also as strong as ever, only lagging behind Fortnite and eking out ahead of Grand Theft Auto 5.

Nevertheless, Activision has pivoted significantly by announcing that it would no longer release back-to-back Modern Warfare and Black Ops titles. “We will drive innovation that is meaningful, not incremental. While we aren’t sharing those plans today, we look forward to doing so when the time is right.” Its developers have apparently been building the “next era of Call of Duty,” and judging by the current release cycle, it may be Modern Warfare 4.

In the meantime, check out our review for Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 here. We gave it a five out of ten for the multiplayer (despite netcode and hit registration issues), and Zombies (despite the overtly safe gameplay loop). The campaign is an utter disaster, but at least Treyarch released an update to let you skip it and go straight to Endgame.

The difference comes down to scale, with Söderlund noting that Embark Studios would have to expand massively just to be able to compete with Activision and EA. However, the studio didn’t want to go down that route, and decided that refining its development pipeline and building tools would have been a smarter way to go while still maintaining a smaller team.

“To start a new studio from scratch and to compete with the likes of EA and Activision and others, if you follow traditional development methodologies, you’re going to have to have five, six, seven hundred people,” he said. “We didn’t want to be that, we couldn’t afford that many people, and we didn’t believe that was the way to get to the right type of innovation and quality.”

“So when we started Embark, we spent the first seven to 10 months conceptualising ARC Raiders and most of the time we spent on production methodologies and building tools and pipelines to change the way games were being developed. With the ambition of being substantially faster in developing games, so that we could compete with these big publishers but with a substantially smaller team.”

Former CEO of parent company Nexon, Owen Mahoney, also commented on Embark Studios’ decision to focus on its developmental tools and production methodologies, noting that the studio was “super intentional” in its decision to not go for a big team too fast.

“You guys were super intentional in that if we have too big a team, it gets very hard to run, we can do a lot with software,” said Mahoney. “And you were also very clear that you wanted to build something different.”

In the same interview, Söderlund had also spoken about ARC Raiders‘ focus on fostering more friendly interactions between players rather than promoting competitive gameplay. He noted that this was the big reason behind features like leaderboards not coming to the extraction shooter.

“We’ve had several discussions about Nemesis systems and all types of things,” he said. “I don’t know where the team are on them right now. I think one of the beauties of this game is the fact that we don’t have those leaderboards, and it’s not competitive.”

“We don’t want to necessarily foster that type of gameplay. The game isn’t about shooting other players. You can do that if you want to, but the ethos of the game has never been to go in and shoot players. It’s a part that we use to craft tension.”

He also went into detail about the PvE roots of ARC Raiders, since that’s what the title was initially announced as, and discussed how adding other players to the same match helped a lot in creating and establishing a sense of tension.

ARC Raiders is available on PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X/S. Check out our review for more details.

Taking into account that Grand Theft Auto 6 was originally slated for release in Fall 2025 before being hit with a couple of delays, Söderlund spoke about waiting for Rockstar Games to announce a proper release date so that Embark Studios could avoid it. He noted that GTA 6 was the only unknown variable in discussions about ARC Raiders’ release date, with the studio having “a pretty reasonable hunch” that Battlefield 6 would be coming out during the same window, and Call of Duty would be following its yearly release cadence.

“When we spoke about whether we should move the game, the first dialogue we had was obviously centred around GTA,” said Söderlund. “We did not want to be close to them. I don’t think anyone wanted to be close to them. And we were waiting for them to announce when they were releasing, and once that became clear, we then felt we could build a date. We had a pretty reasonable hunch that Battlefield was coming around the time frame, we knew that Call of Duty was going to ship roughly when it did because it always does.”

Ultimately, ARC Raiders being released between Battlefield 6 and Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 was an intentional decision by Embark Studios. “It was absolutely something we did intentionally,” he said. “As we started to see more of Battlefield 6, we thought that looked good; we didn’t see much of Call of Duty. But at the end of the day, we felt that the game was ready to be launched.”

The more unique gameplay offered by ARC Raiders when compared to EA’s and Activision’s multiplayer shooters was what gave the studio the confidence to come out between the two titles.

“We had a long, long conversation about [changing the release date], and we came to the conclusion after going back and forth that we believed we had a game that was very strong,” Söderlund explained. “We also believed that we could get to a place where we could be competitive in a different way. We, of course, didn’t think it was a Battlefield in that way, but that the game had enough uniqueness that it could stand on its own legs.”

“We felt that the game was offering something very different from what those other games were, and we also had very strong KPIs from our last technical test, and we did a final test of the game just before launch, which we called Server Slam, gave us more data to feel comfortable with launching.”

ARC Raiders is available on PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X/S. For more details, check out our review. Also check out what Söderlund said about making ARC Raiders a $40 release, his thoughts on competitive features like leaderboards, and potential TV and film adaptations of the extraction shooter.

However, the message brings to light a problem that showcases that perhaps Activision and the developers need to take a step back and re-evaluate a strategy that clearly isn’t working for them. But what was the mistake that has managed to elude the attention of the team? Why does it spell bad news for the franchise?

We’re diving into all of that as we break things down, and explore why Call of Duty might just be headed for further disasters down the line. Let’s jump in!

Damage Control Gone Wrong

Addressing the miserable reception, the developers released a message for its community. Despite all the usual promises of making things better, there was a particular focus on something which makes us uneasy about the future of COD. Things started off well enough with the developers assuring players that they are going to try making Black Ops 7 “one of the best shooter games”, even throwing in a free trial of the game’s multiplayer modes along with a Double XP weekend.

That’s all well and good. It’s probably going to bring a few players to the table. Everyone loves free stuff, after all. The promise of seasonal support is also quite alluring, along with the assertion that player feedback is going to shape the course of how things are made for the game. Up until this point, this is a step in the right direction, showcasing how the team behind the franchise’s content understands what its players want and is willing to commit to fixing its mistakes. Credit where it’s due.

But things don’t get better with the next statement. Speaking about future titles in the franchise the developers have stated that they would “no longer do back-to-back releases of Modern Warfare or Black Ops games…to ensure we provide an absolutely unique experience each and every year”. We’re sure that you, like us, have already spotted the glaring issue with this declaration. There is still going to be a new Call of Duty game every year. Player fatigue is a real thing, but the people behind the Call of Duty franchise seem to assume that it’s a myth. While flipping between various subseries within the franchise could certainly allow for some variety, it’s the fact that the franchise is going to stick to its annual release schedule that has us worried.

It’s a statement that undercuts everything good about the recent update, pinpointing a distinct lack of objectivity in the evaluation of player feedback. Yes, switching things up year after year could let the developers flex their creative chops a little more. But hasn’t the team considered what it could achieve with more time, allowing it to truly focus on delivering on its promise of driving innovation that is “meaningful, not incremental”?

If you’re thinking that switching between subseries is going to be a smart play for the franchise, and that perhaps we’re being a tad paranoid, we’re going to have to disagree. Let’s look at how things have been for the franchise in the past three years, beginning with 2023’s Modern Warfare 3, and dive into why continuing with annual releases isn’t going to fix things for the franchise’s dire straits.

More Titles, More Problems

MW3 2023 marked the beginning of a string of releases that were truly baffling in terms of their quality. For starters, the campaign’s early hours go against the genre’s formula and not in a good way. Its attempts to set up the big bad fall flat, while the missions themselves are downright tedious. The poor enemy AI, lack of interesting objectives and optional quests, and a multiplayer mode that failed to add much to the game’s overall promise.

However, the multiplayer modes were fairly okay and at best, acceptable, and perhaps something to take note of in an otherwise bland game. Black Ops 6 came along in 2024 and had us hoping against hope that the switch to another sub series could help inject some variety and true innovation into a formula that was already testing the patience of its players in the years before MW3.

But that was not to be. While the omnimovement system could have been a fantastic touch that changed the way its players approached the game’s grand set-pieces, it wasn’t really necessary to victory. It was a decision that undercut the very innovation that could have elevated Black Ops 6 and put the games back on the map.

That isn’t to say that the game didn’t have its moments. The campaign was certainly better than the one in the previous year, despite a rather annoying new UI that seemed to want to delay you from enjoying the game as much as possible. The multiplayer modes were sadly a downer, with boring map designs that made matches feel routine rather than fun, along with technical issues that marred the experience. It was clear that the franchise was not able to hit all the right notes, and its annual releases weren’t helping matters.

That brings us to this year, and Black Ops 7. We, along with many others, lamented what was the worst campaign we’d seen in the entire genre. But things might have been different if the rest of the game didn’t feel so drab, almost as if by design. We know that wasn’t the case but how could things go so wrong for these games that held an undeserving hold over its genre, and continues to annoy its players despite the shortcomings that every title presents?

It’s simple. It’s a matter of burnout, as it isn’t only gamers who suffer from spending too much time on annual titles that don’t really do much to stand out from the ones that came before them. And like a person who is unable to find their groove despite their best efforts, the franchise desperately needs a break if it is to ensure that its next instalments turn things around for it.

Should Call of Duty Lay Low For A Bit?

It’s fair that the team behind Black Ops 7 is reaching out to its players, this is the least they can do given the disaster they have released but this effort to try and earn back the trust of its disappointed fan base seems like all talk with no substance. Look, taking accountability for one’s failures and promising to do better is always a great choice, I mean, just take a look at Build A Rocket Boy’s truly tone-deaf effort to mitigate the backlash it was receiving for MindsEye earlier this year.

The developer’s and Activision’s decision to merely fix its games is not going to cut it in a world where excellent shooters like Fortnite, and ARC Raiders exist. Even the Battlefield franchise has managed to get an edge over COD this year despite Battlefield 6’s campaign also being disappointing to a certain degree.

You must be wondering that we’ve come down quite hard on Call of Duty, and that our criticism might seem like it’s unwarranted. But that’s far from the truth. Shooters are a popular genre and we absolutely love the good ones, but sincerely speaking, Call of Duty is well past his shelf time. And, given that there is no stopping the annual train, I see no future for these games in the genre. Call of Duty’s European sales are down more than 50% compared to Black Ops 6. Heck, it even sold 63% fewer copies than Battlefield 6 at launch. These numbers don’t lie and player fatigue is real, something the people behind Call of Duty don’t seem to understand, or perhaps they don’t care as long as money is flowing in.

For any great experience to happen, the game needs to be cooked well. And that needs time. Judging by the developer’s latest statements, it seems that the end results are not going to get any better.

Any video game franchise should be good enough to win player’s resources and money, and one cannot achieve that if it simply rushes its team to churn out a new title without actually lending it the substance and style it needs to actually be a great game. Cyberpunk 2077 should be a very important lesson to the team, and a reminder that good things take time. But hey, pretty sure this advice is going to fall on deaf ears.

I personally wish we don’t see another Call of Duty for a while, sure, its playerbase and hardcore fans will be disappointed but the truth is that there are far better experiences on the market that are doing some exceptional and unique things that the people behind Call of Duty can only imagine.

Note: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, GamingBolt as an organization.

To this, Booty responds by noting that he has been proud of Treyarch and Activision for Call of Duty: Black Ops 7. He also spoke about how difficult it tends to be to release a new game in a major franchise on a yearly basis.

“Right now, it is one of the most-played games on Xbox,” said Booty. “And I’m really proud of what the team did, in terms of feature innovation, moving the franchise forward. Shipping a major franchise like clockwork every year is a really difficult task, and I’m really proud of what the team did to move the franchise forward in that way.”

Ultimately, Booty seems to be quite optimistic about the future of the franchise despite the stumbles faced by Call of Duty: Black Ops 7. He noted that the game is still positioned well as a live-service offering, and that it will continue to get new content through post-launch updates.

“And the interesting thing about Call of Duty is, I think that as an IP, it is really well positioned to continue to deliver content for players going forward; the system of seasons. And it’s not just about the launch, but it’s kind of in its own unique category and ability in terms of how the team keeps delivering content throughout the year. So we’re real happy with where we’ve landed with that,” he said.

Analysts have noted that Call of Duty: Black Ops 7’s generally poorer reception comes down to a few key things, including major competition in the genre, as well as a few poor decisions that were made during the title’s development. Alinea Analytics’ Rhys Elliot spoke about how games like ARC Raiders and Battlefield 6 have been seeing incredible amounts of success, while Fortnite continues to dominate the charts. Call of Duty players, however, have had to contend with some alienation from Activision through the addition of Fortnite-styled cosmetic items like non-military character skins.

“Players have expressed growing dissatisfaction with CoD‘s lack of innovation, feeling that the franchise is ailing. The introduction of Fortnite-like cosmetic items like non-military character skins (Beavis and Butthead, Nicki Minaj) has alienated a significant portion of the fanbase who prefer a more grounded military aesthetic. The co-op campaign was a major point of criticism. It was uneven and tedious when played solo, while also requiring an always-online connection. It also drew controversy and ire for its use of AI slop in game.”

Activision had also announced earlier this year that it will stop doing back-to-back releases for the various sub-series’ under the overall Call of Duty franchise. This means that we won’t see sequels to the Black Ops or Modern Warfare series released in consecutive years, like we did with last year’s Black Ops 6 and this year’s Black Ops 7. Rather, the company plans to give its developers more time, likely by alternating the sub-series’ under Call of Duty as it continues its yearly release cadence for the franchise.

For more details, check out our review of Call of Duty: Black Ops 7, which is out on PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X/S.

In his post, Ybarra wrote about how competition in the market is often a good thing, and how the success seen by titles like Battlefield 6 and ARC Raiders will encourage the developers of Call of Duty to “come back with a vengeance”. He also noted that “We will get a better Call of Duty thanks to Battlefield.”

“Competition is good. I’m rooting for the Call of Duty team to come back with vengeance – for the players and their team. They work incredibly hard and remain very talented,” he wrote.

Interestingly, Ybarra had been one of the earlier critics of the Call of Duty franchise this year, especially in light of the success seen by Battlefield 6’s open beta back in August. At the time, he went as far as to say that the latest entry in the Battlefield franchise “will boot stomp” Call of Duty this year. Even at the time, however, he noted that this will lead to the fact that “Call of Duty won’t be lazy anymore, and we’ll all get better FPS games for it.”

While Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 is unlikely to have resulted in a loss for Activision, the title is clearly not in the zeitgeist this time around, unlike its predecessors which have tended to be the subjects of discussion for several months after their release. Industry analysts like Christopher Dring of The Game Business and Rhys Elliot of Alinea Analytics believe that this is down to the fact that there were some bad decisions made in the development of the game, which also managed to come out in a tough market.

“One reason for the decline is the intense competition from rival shooters, mostly Battlefield 6 and ARC Raiders,” explained Elliot. “The new Battlefield title had a massive launch, securing the biggest opening in its franchise’s history. ARC has sold almost 8 million copies so far, and the latest Fortnite Simpsons crossover was a hit. Attention is scarce.”

“Players have expressed growing dissatisfaction with CoD‘s lack of innovation, feeling that the franchise is ailing. The introduction of Fortnite-like cosmetic items like non-military character skins (Beavis and Butthead, Nicki Minaj) has alienated a significant portion of the fanbase who prefer a more grounded military aesthetic. The co-op campaign was a major point of criticism. It was uneven and tedious when played solo, while also requiring an always-online connection. It also drew controversy and ire for its use of AI slop in game.”

Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 is available on PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X/S. For more details, check out our review. Also check out our thoughts on its boss fights. Activision has also recently announced that the franchise wouldn’t go for back-to-back releases in the Modern Warfare or Black Ops series anymore, instead choosing to alternate their releases.

“Call of Duty has enjoyed long-standing success because of all of you, a passionate community that demands excellence and deserves nothing less,” it said in a recent blog post. “We also know that for some of you, the franchise has not met your expectations fully. To be very clear, we know what you expect and rest assured we will deliver, and overdeliver, on those expectations as we move forward.”

For Black Ops 7, the goal was for “a spiritual successor to Black Ops 2, and the studios have poured their passion into making a great game that all of us are very proud of.” Of course, the results left much to be desired, and Activision is seemingly aware. “It’s one thing for us to say it; more importantly, it’s up to you to try it and judge for yourselves.”

As a result, you’ll no longer see back-to-back sequels for Modern Warfare (which suffered similar criticism with 2023’s Modern Warfare 3). The reasons for this move are “many, but the main one is to ensure we provide an absolutely unique experience each and every year.”

“We will drive innovation that is meaningful, not incremental. While we aren’t sharing those plans today, we look forward to doing so when the time is right.”

It went on to state that the “best days are ahead of us, given the depth and talent of our development teams” and that it’s been building the “next era of Call of Duty.” “It will deliver precisely on what you want, along with some surprises that push the franchise and the genre forward. We look forward to welcoming you in, listening to you, and moving forward together.”

As for the not-so-distant future, there will be a free trial for multiplayer and Zombies, where Activision would appreciate it if you “experience the game firsthand and decide for yourselves.” Not the campaign, though, which it probably wants you to pretend doesn’t exist, please, and thank you.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 is available on Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, PS4, PS5, and PC. Check out our review for more details on why it’s one of the worst entries in the series (so far).