The Long Walk: Call of Duty Elite

Finally announced at the CODXP event today, the paid service part of Elite contains all DLC including map-packs and celebrity video content delivered weekly for $50/yr. This comes on top of the previously announced free content which includes a Bungie-net style web interface that allows for stat tracking, heat maps and tweaking loadouts while not in-game. Interfaces with mobile apps will allow players to review their gameplay and loadout's as well. DLC will hit subscribers first then roll out a la carte to the rest of the community.

The video content will be generated by the Scott-Free team of Ridley and Tony Scott though it unclear whether they will actually create content or oversee creation through their commerical production house. Jason Bateman and Will Arnett will present "N00btube" a commentary smack talk clip show of user-submitted content.

Activision's long held stance that player's will "never" pay for COD multiplayer prevents them from explicitly charging a subscription to play online. However, tying DLC to this sub model makes it a non-issue for the 18 million players who buy the map packs at $15 a pop. Given 3-4 map packs are released per game (and thus per year) a $10 savings is at hand and given the community at large buy the packs, playing online quickly becomes a war of attrition for those with DLC and those without.

This implies that the long term plan is to tie Map Packs EXCLUSIVELY to the subscriptions, dragging 2/3's of the community into a yearly habit. Addicted to the one-off global money juggernaut that is World Of Warcraft, Activision has been dropping WOW style leveling into their action/shooter games. Led by COD perks, these RPG-style leveling cycles drip-feed rewards to players in both single-player and multi-player. Combining a leveling addiction to a subscription-based DLC plan would, in theory, ensure the audience craves its yearly hit of the COD crack-pipe.

The risk to this scheme is Activision's inherent lack of patience for nurturing IP's and building audiences. Proven to be stock-holder profit driven at any cost, COD:Elite will require at least 3-5 years of annual COD releases to draw the majority of the current audience to the subscription model, much less grow the audience.

To date, the annualized method of developing COD games has driven ever larger returns, however, the loss of most of Infinity Ward costs a pall on this year's COD release, Modern Warfare 3. Co-developed by a half-dozen companies under the Activision banner, MW3 currently holds the highest pre-order amounts of any COD ever. Dependant entirely on the multiplayer to continue to deliver well after the games release, MW 3 runs the risk of being too much of the same or too different. Iterating under the guise of innovating, Activision has to walk the line of giving the audience want they think they want. COD:Blops successfully continued the relentlessly linear scripted campaigns that dominated COD post-Modern Warfare while serving exciting and rewarding multi-player that is notoriousily imperable to noobies just weeks after release.

Modern Warfare 3 will likely continue the trend of demolishing sales-records but the great unknown is whether a non-IW developed MW3 will resonate with the audience enough to carry them over the next COD, or whether it will explode onto the scene only to lose audience back to COD:Blops

Should MW3 be the beginning of the end of COD, Elite will be strangled in the crib.