14 DAY TRIAL // Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare might be treated by publisher Activision as its biggest launch of the fall season, but it seems that at the moment pre-orders placed for the title are lower than initially expected and have only reached about 50 percent of what the earlier title in the franchise, Call of Duty: Ghosts, had at the same moment.
The information comes from Doug Creutz, an analyst working for Cowen and Company, who is quoted by VentureBeat as saying that the placed pre-orders are also 80% lower than those for Black Ops 2, which might be one sign that the series is on a permanent downward slope when it comes to sales.
Despite the lower numbers, it seems that Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare can still be a success if the team at Activision steps up the marketing campaign for it and delivers more info about the crucial multiplayer modes.
Creutz states, “We believe that the preorders need to accelerate significantly over the next few weeks. Or else the evidence for meaningfully weaker performance by Advanced Warfare vs. Ghosts will, in our opinion, become too strong to rationalize.”
Activision has not offered any reaction to the info about smaller than expected pre-orders and has not said how much it plans to invest in the promotional efforts for its big shooter launch.
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare changes the multiplayer paradigm
Sledgehammer Games, the new studio that is in charge of Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare, has announced that it is introducing a set of big changes to the multiplayer component of the title.
The new exoskeleton technology, which gamers are free to customize in a variety of ways, will put an emphasis on mobility.
Gamers will be able to reach new areas in maps that are designed to offer verticality, and there are new ways to dodge attacks and to deliver powerful melee blows.
At the moment, there are 12 game modes that will be included; two of them, called Momentum and Uplink, are entirely new to the series.
The changes have been welcomed with mixed reactions by the community, which might be one explanation for the pre-order drop.
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare is set to arrive on November 4 on the PC, the PlayStation 4, the Xbox One, and last-gen consoles, and there is also a Day Zero Edition offered for the truly hardcore gaming crowd, which gives them access to the title one day earlier and includes a double experience boost for the period.
