Monthly active users of Activision's Call of Duty series of games have fallen by a third over the past year, the company has confirmed.
In March 2021, Activision had 150 million monthly active players in its games, with the main sources likely being Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War and Call of Duty: Warzone.
In March 2022, Activision still had 100 million monthly active players, although one-third fewer than a year ago.
Activision has acknowledged the fact that Call of Duty revenue has declined year-over-year, and it blames this on its flagship call of duty: Vanguard in 2021, which sold poorly compared to 2020's Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War, but also blamed it on the "lower player engagement" of the free-to-play game Call of Duty: Warzone.
But it's unclear where the 50 million lost players left, whether they dropped Call of Duty: Warzone, skipped call of duty's annual release, or both.
Can Activision turn the tide?
Activision is also expected to launch another new COD prototypical this year, this time as a sequel to 2019's Call of Duty 16: Modern Warfare.
This year will also see the new Call of Duty: Warzone "unveiled," though the details have been blurred.
On Blizzard's business side, monthly active users continue to decline for a long time. Last November, the media reported that Blizzard's player activity fell 13% year-on-year to 26 million.
Now, as of March 31, Blizzard's monthly active users have slipped further to 22 million.
Blizzard hopes to turn that around with the launch of the free mobile game Diablo: Immortal, which will land on mobile phones and PCs in a public beta version in June.
The troubled developer is trying to get itself back on track when the release date of Diablo: Immortal is being announced this week after a year of legal proceedings involving allegations of the company's corporate culture, including sexual harassment and employee discrimination, sparked a spate of employee strikes, employees trying to form unions and frustration with controversial company CEO Bobby Kotick.