Late last month, Activision Blizzard (ATVI) finally revealed that the next game in the company's huge Call of Duty video game franchise would be known as Call of Duty: WW2.
Rather than continue trying to build yet another installment in the franchise set in the future (the company's most recent game, Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare, didn't do that well in the market), the company's next Call of Duty game will, as the title suggests, be set during World War 2.
Image source: Activision Blizzard.
Although the game isn't out yet (it launches on Nov. 3), Activision Chief Operating Officer (COO) Thomas Tippl did offer some interesting preliminary data points on the company's most recent earnings that might suggest that Call of Duty: WWII will fare better than its predecessor did.
Gamers seem interested
Tippl said that the company's "global live stream" in which it revealed Call of Duty: WWII "became the most watched live stream in Call of Duty history."
Not only did a lot of people seemingly pay attention to the reveal of Call of Duty: WWII, but the reception among viewers appears to have been quite good.
"The reveal trailer has gone on to become the most liked trailer in Call of Duty history, and became the fastest video to reach 10 million views in Call of Duty history," Tippl said on the call.
As of a check early on May 8, the video had just over 932,000 "likes" and just under 83,000 "dislikes" on YouTube (a 92% "like" rate).
It's worth contrasting this to the reception of the Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare reveal trailer. Per this table found in the Wikipedia article titled, "List of most disliked YouTube videos," the Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare trailer took second place.
As of a recent check, 3.533 million users disliked the trailer, with only about 574,000 users liking the video (just a 14% "like" rate).
Additionally, Tippl provided some preliminary pre-order information, saying that pre-orders "are off to a very strong start."
Foolish takeaway
Call of Duty is an important franchise for Activision Blizzard, and it's encouraging to see that the upcoming installment in the franchise is seeing much better reception than its predecessor did when it was first revealed.
It's worth keeping in mind, though, that Call of Duty ultimately lives and dies by the quality of the multiplayer portion of the game, and the company has yet to show the game's multiplayer component publicly.
What investors ought to keep an eye on going forward is the kind of reception Activision Blizzard gets from the community, gaming press, and so on when it finally demonstrates Call of Duty: WWII's multiplayer component at the E3 trade show set to begin on June 13.
If the various game footage, hands-on impressions from attendees, and so on all point to a much more compelling game than what Activision Blizzard released with Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare, then that could give investors additional reason to be excited about Call of Duty: WWII.
