Activision is well known for following a formula and rarely deviating from it. That stubborness almost kept one of their biggest hits from happening, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare.
In an interview with Official Playstation Magazine, the head of Infinity Ward had this to say:
“With Call of Duty 2, we were dead set against it being World War 2, but Activision really wanted it, the compromise sort of being that we’d get some dev kits for consoles in exchange for doing a World War 2 game. We always wanted to be on consoles and Activision saw us as more of a PC developer, and something I’ll add to that, Activision also did not want Modern Warfare. They thought working on a modern game was risky and [thought], ‘oh my god you can’t do that, it’s crazy!’ They were doing market research to show us we were wrong the whole time,”
It’s true, I don’t think that many saw Infinity Ward as much of a console developer, but it’s what they wanted to do. Call of Duty 2 was a relative hit on the 360, and Call of Duty 4 has sold 14 million copies, so who was wrong?
I understand Activision’s perspective; making games can be expensive, and they’ve always taken the cheapest and most reliable route. This ends up suffocating creativity, and if IW wasn’t allowed to make Modern Warfare, the new and risky game, where would they be? Making Call of Duty: World Warfare (not to be confused with “World at War”, yet both stuck in the 1940′s)?
This should be a lesson to Activision, let creative people decide on creative things. You’re raking in such an outrageous amount from the Guitar Hero series’ continual sales and World of Warcraft. You can afford one or two risky ventures, especially if they pay off this big.
Source: Computer and Video Games and Official Playstation Magazine (print!)
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