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Call of Duty 2023 reportedly delayed by Activision until 2024

Call of Duty will reportedly take a year off as next year's game might have been delayed to 2024.

Updated 2/222/22 at 5:50 p.m. PT: An Activision spokesperson reached out to Shacknews with the following statement following the publishing of this news story:

The rest of the story remains as originally written.

The Call of Duty franchise has been seeing annual releases for many years, throughout industry evolution and changes at its various studios. However, that may be changing at long last. A new Bloomberg report states that next year’s Call of Duty, which is being developed by Treyarch, has been delayed to 2024.

The report that next year’s Call of Duty had been delayed was shared on February 22, 2022. According to Bloomberg’s sources, the delay was the direct result of the poor performance of the franchise’s latest entry, Call of Duty: Vanguard, which received its fair share of negative feedback from fans and critics alike. If the report proves to be true, 2023 will be the first year without a new Call of Duty release since 2004.

SCOOP: For the first time in two decades, Call of Duty will skip a year. Activision has delayed 2023's game, made by Treyarch, to 2024, sources tell Bloomberg. It's a shocking move that will have a massive impact on the franchise and the industry. https://t.co/tiozvqB1cE

— Jason Schreier (@jasonschreier)

The Call of Duty game originally scheduled for 2023 is in the works at Treyarch and has not been officially revealed. It’s unclear if the game will stick to the Q3 slot or if Activision will look for a new release window. The report states that the decision to delay next year’s game had nothing to do with the recent Microsoft acquisition of Activision Blizzard.

As for this year, Call of Duty 2022 is still set to hit its original date. Though specific details are yet to be shared, we know that it’s being developed by Infinity Ward and is a sequel to Modern Warfare (2019).

With how big of a tentpole release that Call of Duty has been for almost the past two decades, it will be interesting to see what impact this delay has on not only the business of Activision Blizzard, but the rest of the video game industry.