The Call of Duty franchise is finally breaking tradition, as its next entry will no longer release on last-generation consoles, meaning Activision won’t have to hold back any longer and fully harness all available technologies.
This news comes from the official Call of Duty X/Twitter page, which wrote that “the next Call of Duty is not being developed for PS4″, a response to a previous rumour that the next game in the franchise, which many believed to be Modern Warfare 4, was being playtested on Sony’s last-gen consoles.
Unsurprisingly, many were disappointed in that rumour, since developing a cross-gen platform game means cutbacks had to be made to the modern console versions in order to make porting to last-gen an easier process. Recent titles, while graphically impressive for series standards, still feel dated in some ways, notably in terms of texture resolution and with regard to their graphics engine, so now that these rumours have been quelled once and for all, this gives the developer room to make a bigger technological leap for their next title.
This also marks the end of an era, as the Call of Duty franchise is one of the last major gaming franchises that still caters to last-gen consoles, first with 2013’s Call of Duty: Ghosts and up until 2025’s Call of Duty: Black Ops 7. It’s unclear why Activision has finally made the decision to drop last-gen consoles, and if other major game studios will follow suit, especially considering that the PS4 will be turning 13 soon.
With one less console to worry about, perhaps this will mark Activision’s shift to focus on other platforms instead. Microsoft previously signed an agreement with Nintendo after acquiring Activision in 2021, with the goal of bringing the franchise to Nintendo platforms. It might be a long shot, but perhaps future titles will be released for both modern consoles and the Nintendo Switch 2 instead.
Kevin is a reformed PC Master Race gamer with a penchant for franchise “duds” like Darksiders III and Dead Space 3. He has made it his life-long mission to play every single major game release – lest his wallet dies trying.
