The hubbub of Infinity Ward and Activision is huge. Call of Duty creators Vince Zampella and Jason West have supposedly been speaking to other publishers. Lawsuits are in order, the two are now gone from Infinity Ward, and Activision may be searching for incriminating documents, alleging communication between Infinity Ward and other publishers, specifically EA.

But why would they do that? They left EA, created one of Activision's most popular franchises, and just released one of the biggest blockbuster titles to date. Doesn't that make Activision and Infinity Ward the best of partners?

Apparently not. When Infinity Ward's creators initially left EA, the current #2 gaming publisher in the world was in a similar position to Activision: at the top of their game, raking in the big bucks, and selling some of the hottest games around. But they were also controlling, and ended up making Zampella and West decide to leave, presumably because they are artists and creators, not marketers and moneymakers.

With that mindset in hand, they went to Activision and created Call of Duty, which became a smash hit and single-handedly killed the Medal of Honor franchise. Not only did it make bring Infinity Ward into the limelight, it helped propel Activision to the status they currently have now: videogame publisher supergiant. Ironically, Infinity Ward's success has been their curse. Each new game they bring pulls in so much money and demand that the publishers step in to make sure no mistakes are made.

So who's at fault? Activision can't be blamed; as a publisher, it's their job to do whatever it takes to ensure the games they publish make the most money. Infinity Ward, on the other hand, put themselves in harms way, for the second time. It's no coincidence that the two largest game publishers have taken advantage of the popular developer to make money, and the pattern is repeating now.

If Infinity Ward is indeed looking to EA for future projects, it makes sense. EA has for the last three years been very generous to their developers, and has also helped create quite a few new IPs. Activision, however, won't just let the developer go, and has a vice-grip stronger than any competitor today. Our only message to Zampella and West: make sure Activision doesn't find anything compromising. We don't want to see you go just yet.

There has been quite a bit of activity lately between Call of Duty developer Infinity Ward and publisher Activision which started with the arrival of some "bouncer-types" at the offices of Infinity Ward and later lead to confirmation that studio heads Vince Zampella and Jason West were no longer under the developer's employ. Aside from some vague explanations made by Activision concerning breaches of contracts and investigations of "insubordination", cold hard details behind why Vince and Jason left the studio have been sparse, but here are the facts and speculations we know so far.

(more...)

[Update] It looks like CEO and founder of Infinity Ward, Vince Zampella, and co-founder, Jason West, have officially left Infinity Ward according to their LinkedIn pages. In regard to working for Infinity Ward, both LinkedIn pages now have an end date of March 2010. The reason behind the departure is still unclear aside from what was mentioned in the SEC filing Activision submitted.

Yesterday some news landed that some intimidating "bouncer-type" men had showed up at the offices of Call of Duty developer Infinity Ward. These men were tight lipped concerning the reasons why they were at the building which, understandably, caused some confusion and worry. Later, senior developers Jason West and Vince Zampella were noticably absent from the premices and following some news that the two developers had met earlier that day with Activision, in addition to an update to Jason West's Facebook status (posted by Kotaku) and LinkedIn profile, it appears the two developers have been released from Infinity Ward.

According to an SEC filing Activision submitted yesterday morning, a human resources investigation had been cited by the publisher concerning "breaches of contracts and insubordination by two senior employees at Infinity Ward." It appears one of those employees is Jason West, but at this time its unconfirmed if Vince Zampella was the other.

From within the report:

"This matter is expected to involve the departure of key personnel and litigation. At present, the Company does not expect this matter to have a material impact on the Company."

Details are sparse as to what sort of insubordination or breaches in contract took place here. Considering Infinity Ward's Modern Warfare 2 is a money maker for the publisher you have to wonder what would of had to take place for Activision to cut out two of the developers behind the game. There could be a perfectly legitimate reason why these guys were shown the door, but little is known at this time.

Numerous Activision studios are downsizing their staff, including Neversoft, Radical Entertainment, Luxoflux and Underground Development. The publisher cites the decline of sales in the music-game business as well as the shift from packaged goods to digital distribution.

Roughly 90 members have already been let go from Prototype developer Radical Entertainment, and Luxoflux is being shut down entirely, resulting in the loss of 56 jobs. It's also being reported that 50 positions at Neversoft have been cut.

"As we discussed on our earnings conference call yesterday, we are directing our resources against the largest and most profitable business segments, and as part of this initiative, we are realigning our resources to better reflect our slate and the market opportunities," Activision said in a statement issued yesterday. "At the same time, we are increasing our digital/online capabilities as we expect that digital/online will continue to become a more meaningful part of our business model in the years ahead."

[via GI.biz]

Activision has said that the Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 DLC will be coming this spring, but it has not given a more specific window. CVG reports that a "reliable source" has told them the DLC will be releasing on Xbox Live this April, which would fit nicely with the spring release date Activision suggested.

There's still no word on what the DLC will include, although it's been unofficially confirmed that it will contain new maps. Whatever it is, it will be a timed exclusive on the Xbox 360, releasing sometime later on PS3 and PC.

Activision revealed that, to our absolute surprise, another Call of Duty is coming this year, and the franchise will continue to have an annual release schedule. However, the publisher also, once again, brought up the idea of a possible subscription-based Call of Duty.

"Our strategy continues to be to annualize our key franchises. We've indicated before that Call of Duty is on a two year development cycle given the content and work that needs to go into a high-quality game experience," said Activision's Mike Griffith. "We also have new business models potentially for the franchise in the future and we've been building capabilities on both the business development side as well as the studio side of it."

As if that wasn't clear enough, Activision CEO Bobby Kotick hinted, "If you think about the success that we've had in other product categories on subscription, you can get a sense of the direction that we want to take that franchise."

As mentioned before, this isn't the first time Activision has suggested a subscription-based model. They also made the notion back in November.

[via TVGB]

The rumors have been proven true. Activision's failed title Tony Hawk: Ride will be getting a sequel, the company confirmed today. Even in spite of the absolute ripping critics gave it and the fact that Mr. Hawk himself had to resort to being people's friend just to get them to play his game, the publisher believes it can turn opinions around by giving the game more polish.

"It took longer to optimize the hardware, leaving less time to optimize the software," explained Activision publishing boss Mike Griffith.

Fortunately, the company will be scaling back its over-saturated Guitar Hero franchise. The music-game genre took a huge hit in 2009, which obviously prompted the company to pull back on Guitar Hero. Activision produced 25 music-related SKUs in 2009. This year? It's producing just two "Hero" games.

Activision also plans to cut costs by dropping Guitar Hero development for the PlayStation 2.

During today's conference call, Activision revealed that a new Call of Duty will be coming this year (surprise!). Following last year's huge success with Modern Warfare 2, the company is not expecting the franchise to "hit 2009 highs." Call of Duty is "not planned on repeating the same level of success on this year's title," clarified Activision's Mike Griffith.

The game is rumored to release this November and take place in the Vietnam War. It will be developed by Treyarch.

Despite the lowered expectations, Activision is still "bullish" on both performance and quality for the title.

In its conference call with investors, Activision Blizzard announced that the beta for StarCraft II will be releasing "later this month." It will be a closed worldwide beta. The game is planned for a mid-2010 release.

We also learned earlier the full game will be downloadable through the overhauled Battle.net.

In its conference call with investors today, Activision Blizzard's Bobby Kotick revealed that the much-anticipated StarCraft II will be downloadable through Blizzard's updated Battle.net service (which they previewed yesterday).

The new Battle.net will apparently be the foundation of all of Blizzard's new games from here on out, notable StarCraft II and Diablo III.

Unfortunately, there hasn't been any word on the beta yet, but we'll keep you posted.