Sony has many arguments as to why they don’t want Microsoft to acquire Activision Blizzard and one of those is that Call of Duty won’t be put on PS Plus. In fact, Sony implies that none of Activision’s other titles will be available on PlayStation Plus either, with players needing to subscribe to Xbox Game Pass instead.
Why Call of Duty won’t be on PS Plus
Microsoft has apparently made it clear that Call of Duty and other Activision titles like Spyro and Crash Bandicoot will not be available on any game subscription services other than Xbox Game Pass, Sony claims in their response to the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) Issues Statement. As Sony considers its PS Plus multi-game subscription service to be “critical to its future competitiveness”, it considers Call of Duty on PS Plus to be “essential”.
Instead, Sony believes that if it wanted the games to be available on a subscription service, Microsoft would insist it should allow Game Pass to be accessible on PS5 and PS4. This is in contrast to previous assertions from Xbox CEO Phil Spencer that this would not happen and is in addition to the 10-year deal Sony was already offered to keep Call of Duty on PS5 and PS4.
Sony points out that a contract is never foolproof against a foreclosure, especially as Microsoft has previously acquired studios like Zenimax before making their games Xbox exclusive. As such, Sony concludes that “Microsoft’s past conduct shows that its public utterances should be treated with extreme scepticism”. The arguments continue for now.
