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Call of Duty: Vanguard, this year’s regularly planned Call of Duty game, does not appear to be selling as well as prior Call of Duty titles. One major explanation for this could be that everyone is too preoccupied with other games.
In recent months, GamesIndustry.biz conducted a survey of 671 gaming convention attendees regarding their Call of Duty purchasing habits, in collaboration with PAX and EGX. 284 people indicated they bought a Call of Duty game in the last five years, whereas only 59 (21%) stated they bought Vanguard.
More than half of those who had previously purchased a Call of Duty game but did not acquire Vanguard stated they were too busy playing other games.
In fact, many of the responders appeared to be preoccupied with other games. 34 percent indicated they had recently played too much Call of Duty, and 14 percent claimed they were already satisfied with Call of Duty: Warzone. Another 11% indicated they were looking forward to playing a new game, with some citing Battlefield 2042 and Halo: Infinite as examples.
Others said they were turned off by reviews (20%) or price (4%), that they weren’t interested in WWII games (24%), that they didn’t want to support Activision Blizzard because of ‘business practises’ or ‘treatment of employees’ (6%), that the community was full of cheaters (3%), that the single-player mode wasn’t good enough (2%), or that the download size was too large (2%). (2 percent ).
While this is a small sample of game fans, early sales data appear to indicate a general lack of enthusiasm for Vanguard. In both retail and digital sales, Vanguard sold less units at launch than previous year’s entry, Black Ops Cold War, in the UK and Europe (down 44 percent ). Nonetheless, it is the second-largest game launch of 2021 in the same territories (behind FIFA, as usual).
It’s also not receiving the best reviews. While we believed Vanguard had a well-polished narrative, it is also relatively short and lacks variation, and the multiplayer doesn’t stand out from previous Call of Duty games. And the general judgement on Vanguard is that it isn’t quite as good as its Call of Duty counterparts.
Battlefield 2042, a fellow war shooter, has received even poorer reviews, but it was one of Steam’s most-played titles last week. Fortunately, the people polled who were holding out for Halo Infinite appear to be in for a treat.
