Xbox Won’t Make Call of Duty Games Exclusive, Phil Spencer Reiterates

The Call of Duty series will never become an Xbox-exclusive game.

Microsoft Gaming and Xbox head Phil Spencer recently reiterated his position regarding the possibility of the Call of Duty series becoming an Xbox exclusive should regulators approve Microsoft's acquisition of Activision Blizzard.

Many government regulators, including the FTC and the UK's Competition and Markets Authority, are investigating Microsoft's acquisition deal with Activision Blizzard due to its capability of hurting Microsoft's competition.

Phil Spencer's Stance Regarding Call Of Duty Exclusivity

Spencer mentioned in an interview on the Xbox One YouTube channel that Microsoft is not entertaining the idea of making the Call of Duty series exclusive to the Xbox platform, per Gameranx.

According to the Xbox head, making the series an exclusive is "not the game [Microsoft] is trying to play," and the same version of the game will be available on all platforms, which is something the company does today with Mojang Studios' Minecraft.

Spencer cited the difference between the Xbox's copy of Hogwarts Legacy and the PlayStation's, with him noting that the latter's copy has one extra mission exclusive to its platform, and the former gets the original or "vanilla" copy without any additions whatsoever, per Video Games Chronicle.

"We want to make sure thos players feel like they have a grreat experience on the paltform they choose to play on," Spencer said. "When we say available everywhere or not exclusive, we want to make absolutely the best version of Call of Duty for any player on any of those platforms."

You may remember that Spencer mentioned a similar statement back in Sept. 2022 that Microsoft is committed to making the same version of Call of Duty available on PlayStation on the same day it launches elsewhere. He also mentioned that it knows players benefit from the approach it took, as it did the same thing when it acquired Mojang Studios' Minecraft.

To make the Call of Duty series available to all platforms, the company made deals with Nintendo and NVIDIA to bring the series' games to their platforms over the span of ten years once regulators green-light the acquisition deal. Microsoft also gave the same offer to Sony, but the latter company has yet to accept it.

Status Of Microsoft's Acquisition Of Activision Blizzard

Antitrust regulators worldwide are still investigating Microsoft's acquisition deal with Activision Blizzard, with Microsoft's president, Brad Smith, going to the European Commission to showcase the deal's benefits and convince it to approve the acquisition.

A delegation of 18 senior executives from various companies like Google, Nvidia, EA, and Valve, including Activision CEO Robert Kotick, accompanies Smith to provide the commission with their opinions on the matter.

Since then, there has been no word about the deal's status, though the absence of any news could mean that the acquisition's fate is still very much in the air.

Interestingly, Microsoft also added a new page specifically detailing how beneficial its acquisition of Activision will be before or during the time Smith is convening with the European Commission.