What do you need to know
- The new trailer for Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 shows historical figures such as former US President Bill Clinton and former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.
- These characters speak of a war in the shadows, hidden from public view.
- Along with this trailer, Microsoft and Activision have officially confirmed that Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 is launching Day One on Xbox Game Pass.
- The full reveal of Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 is coming on June 9, 2024 as part of the Xbox Games Showcase and Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Direct.
History is a lie.
That’s the main message of the new live-action trailer for Call of Duty: Black Ops 6, which shows various historical leaders, such as former US President Bill Clinton and former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, discussing the nature of war in the shadows. Along with the trailer, Microsoft and Activision officially confirmed via Xbox Wire that Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 will launch on Xbox Game Pass on day one.
You can watch the trailer below.
The full reveal of the game will come on June 9, 2024 as part of the Xbox Games Showcase and Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Direct. While Blizzard Entertainment’s Diablo 4 was added to Microsoft’s game subscription service back in March, the move will mark the first day Activision Blizzard King’s title has been included in the service since Microsoft acquired Activision Blizzard King for $69 billion in October 2023.
Call of Duty will remain a cross-platform franchise in line with Microsoft’s binding commitments, meaning Xbox, PlayStation and Windows PC players will be able to buy the game when it launches later in 2024, although Xbox Game Pass and PC Game Pass remain limited. on the Xbox console and PC hardware, or
Call of Duty has been four years in the making
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 has been in development longer than any title in the franchise, with work taking place over the past four years. Development was led by Treyarch, although the game naturally received development support from almost every team under the Activision Publishing wing.
Recent Call of Duty games have suffered from a lack of development time, with the annual release of the franchise requiring additional resources and studios as fast or faster than Activision could muster. Last year’s entry, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 (2023) had a campaign that was reportedly developed in just 16 months, which in turn reportedly required a massive crunch and resulted in a poorly received story mode, although the multiplayer was popular among players.
Analysis: Simply seismic movement
There is simply no other way to express it: This is a massive step. Call of Duty has not been associated with the Xbox brand since 2014’s Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare, which will be decade old this fall. Re-associating alongside the launch of the first-party Xbox Game Pass is gargantuan. We’ll have to wait and see how things pan out, but this is the right (and frankly necessary) commitment after the hard work that went into closing the acquisition.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m still frustrated with some of Microsoft’s recent choices. However, it is a great burst of positive energy and I hope they can build on it properly in the coming weeks and months.
Hopefully we’ll see more additions to Xbox Game Pass from the Activision Blizzard King library soon. There are a number of Call of Duty games themselves that can be added in batches or patches throughout the game’s launch, not to mention titles like Spyro, Crash, and Diablo outside of the latest entries.