Call of Duty vs Battlefield: Ex-DICE, Bungie & Activision Unpack It All

Will Battlefield out sell Call of Duty this year?
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love to have Chris Sides introduce himself. Welcome back to the cast, Chris.
Thanks. Yeah, I was on a shooter podcast, I don't know, months ago. But yeah, my name's Chris Sides. I've been in the industry for about 15 years, mainly EA and Bungie. My most recent job within a at a game company was I was the director of product on Marathon for about four years. And then over the last year or so, I've been doing my own side projects and and doing consulting.
And from the illustrious warmth of Los Angeles, it's Christopher Andros. You have a famous LinkedIn following, at least I I follow. And you've also had the unfortunate pleasure of working with Game Economists on Call of Duty from what I understand too.
Thanks for the intro and thanks for the invites. This is a lovely crew. First time long time. So a bit of a history on me. I worked on pretty much every big shooter in the last 10 plus years. Insert a shooter in EA. I I I worked on it. I was very lucky to insert a shooter in in Activision for five years. I worked on a few of those. and for

another 5 years even more shooters and other games at 10 cent. So very excited for the future on what's coming up and very excited for what we're seeing with Battlefield 6. I love the franchise, longtime player. I'm so happy to see whatever Call of Duty DNA at work on what we're playing these days in the day in the open beta.
Uh each of us have worked on like one of the major shooters.
Uh we've we've touched it unique. Yeah. Battlefield over here in in Sweden for me, Chris. at least at least Call of Duty, which we can talk about. I'd love to understand more. And Chris, Mr. Chrisides for a Bungie, touching some of their like most storied franchises.
We we have a qualified crew today. I'd like to start start with some hot takes. Uh will Battlefield out sell Call of Duty this year?
No. So, can I jump can I jump in fast to add some context?
Please, let's go. back in 2016. The currently the record holder for the

highest player count for for Battlefield is Battlefield 1, which came out like I believe October of 2016. And a few weeks after that, arguably the greatest first person shooter ever to this day is Titanfall 2 released. and sandwiched between there I believe you had Call of Duty Call of Duty Infinite Warfare also released. So let me tell me if I'm wrong Philip from the numbers you're seeing even with that stacked lineup amazing games Call of Duty Infinite Warfare still outsold Battle Battlefield 1 and Titanfall 2 combined. Is that correct? Am I
Well, so hold up. I would a couple things on numbers as we talk about the podcast today. First of all, it's almost always going to be Steam numbers
that we look at here. It's it's hard to get unit sales. Usually, you get unit sales like months later. They're different time series. Hard to compare. So, I think I just want to put that asterisk
first.
Now, I think from what I understand is

that Advanced Warfare did out Battlefield 1, but the shape of those curves differed and people reached particular milestones at different points.
I think that's fair to say, but that that is when the franchises came the closest.
Mhm. I think it's also fair. That's when Call of Duty was the weakest and Battlefield was the strongest. But I think your overall point that the size and disparity of the successes of the franchise, I don't think people understand, but we're talking about like a 5x difference
between Call of Duty
and Battlefield even at their height.
Mhm. I
think that Battlefield I think it'll sell well. I think it's like it's kind of a love story or an apology I guess to player base from 2042. And so I think it'll sell well. But I mean Call of Duty is just a monster. It's juggernaut. It's just a bill that Call of Duty players pay every year. Um, it's like Netflix. It's or Peacock may have, you know, uh, what is that show? Love Island, but it's not going to be Netflix, you know, like like it's just not going to even though it's a still a good, you know, if you like those shows, it's still good. It's just not going to happen. Even though what Call of Duty would have to do, I mean, at this point, it's just like I

mean, I'm part of that, too. I'm I'll buy the new Call of Duty regardless. And I'll buy the new Battlefield. Granted, I may be more core audience than other people, but I imagine that maybe sales will be kind of decent, but player like share of play time. There's a lot of overlap
and I think that that is probably going to play impact on
maybe it impacts peak concurrent users of COD, but I don't think it's going to harm like the business model in any fashion. To answer your question, Philip, if you're asking me just a guy off the street now, do I think that any game can outsell Call of Duty? It's going to be it's going to be probably not unless your game is like a Red Dead Redemption or a GTA. Historically, the bestselling year every year is a Call of Duty unless a Rockstar Games game is released that year. You can look through the historicals and this is pretty and I trust those numbers. So, that being said, the this particular Battlefield, Battlefield 6, I, as someone who's

worked on it in in a previous life, as as a as a lifelong gamer and a lifelong shooter player, I personally have never seen so much goodwill built up for a Battlefield game. Never seen it. And I love to see it. I'm loving what I'm seeing. I'm loving what I'm playing.
So, would you have it out selling Call of Duty this year? it gun to head gun like just thinking with my thinking with my head not with my heart. I I don't think so just because of how of how much of a juggernaut Call of Duty is.
Yep.
That's kind of where I sit too. I mean I think that a lot of us I mean I'll say like I think it would be cool to see a first person shooter out selling COD would be a milestone.
Um there's a part of me that wishes it would happen but I just don't see how it's possible regardless of how good Battlefield is. Here here would be my bull case for Battlefield. Chris, you made a you made a really astute point. This just the scale of the differences. People don't understand. It's never happened. Although again, it's like, okay, did Battlefield 1 out sell B the Advanced Warfare during the end of that

year? Okay, we can debate that. But yeah, in terms of lifetime sales, it's just there such different magnitudes people don't understand. The rivalry is mostly in in the Swedes heads. Um although I'd like it to be more real. I think the the thing about Battlefield that's really important to note, it's very European game. It's very European focused in terms of the player base. France and Germany [ __ ] love this franchise is they love it in a way that I think is not comparable to the United States which I think has a very strong US base. I mean even go back to those Call of Duty ads. Remember they had Kobe bringing the boys back together. I think there's just a staple of American culture that Call of Duty has imprinted itself in that Battlefield doesn't quite have in Europe but still has a relatively stronger hold. And I think what's interesting about Battlefield, this one that I think people are underestimating is that it's using a lot of American imagery. It is set in America, you're seeing a lot of New York. And so I do wonder if that appeal can push it over the line on top of everything else. Call of Duty being weak
and Battlefield being potentially at its strongest. You know, is is this the moment? And so I think by the end of the

year, I'm willing to throw down for Battlefield on this one, too. I'm willing to I'm willing to take the Battlefield case on that. And I and I I need that to get over the edge as some setting some setting pixie dust.
I'm going to give you two two perspectives, Philip and Chris. When it comes to what what Call of Duty has really going for it this year, it all it still carries the the Black Ops label. The Black Ops sub franchise is very powerful and draws a lot of brand power into it. It's a it's like a brand within a brand at this point. the Black Ops subranchise. One of the biggest things going for COD is literally its name. If you guys watch the amazing movie The Founder, at the end he talks about McDonald's being so amazing of a name.
McDonald's sounds like America. Call of Duty sounds also like America. I think that I think I like I like I'm very serious. The name is the value in that IP. Call of Duty. M
being said when it comes to what you

mentioned as someone who lives in Sweden is this is very I think remarkable when you mentioned the Americana of this partic this year's Battlefield and I'm not going to be specific here but there's a major publisher whose not Activision whose bestselling titles within their entire history were games that took place and we're focused on the Americana culture. Americana is a cultural export to a degree to people outside of the US that I don't think people in the US really understands, but it sounds like from your observations. It's it is a selling point and it could make a difference to getting people outside of the US who are already into Battlefield to really engage further on this year's game. If that's this, if that is if that is what you see, I think there's some power there. I like it.
What about Medal of Honor? Well, what about Medal of Honor?
Medal of Honor.
We didn't get to talk about that

franchise.
Medal of Honor is very American, though. I don't know if other countries have Medal of Honors.
That's true.
Or they call it something different.
Medal of Honor is I think the godfather of the FPS genre to a degree. Like Vince and the team at IW uh IW like they worked on like I worked with them on Medal of Honor like 20 years ago. Then they went to and formed IW. Then they went off back to EA Respawn Respawn. So it's it's it seems to be like a dead IP. Maybe it comes back. I don't know how though. I don't know.
Well, they had the VR they had the VR thing that did beond.
It's called Above and Beyond.
An asterisk.
Mhm. Halfife was a good VR game as well. I like it. Still looks good.
I think it matters. I think the global story here matters. I guess is I guess what I put forward more than anything. And I I see I see Battlefield trying to shape a thesis around like, hey,
we got to we got to I don't want to say fix this regional problem, but hey, it's an opportunity
for us to grow in a way that we haven't grown before. I mean, one of the things we did on Battlefield 5 is you remember

we had these elite units, which are almost like these mini personalities. And one of the things that I like I personally pulled in terms of data was that like the elite units always sold best in their home country. And so we started to play on that idea even more. And if you look like Rainbow Six Siege, they play on nationalities quite a bit.
They like the flag of the operators prominently displayed and it's something that like Blizzard is also good at, right? Like they set things in Toronto or Brazil, like rural locations people can understand. And I I think that's that's a great marketing strategy. I don't know if it's enough
to put them to put them over the edge, but I do think it's it's a it's a good it's good that they picked up on this and and ran with it. I think it's the right idea to test. I mean, what else are you going to do? We're out of theaters, people. you know, we we've gone to the future, the past. I mean, what else? Where else can we go?
Yeah. So, you mentioned something very good about audience activation as well. This is what Valerant is very and I think to a degree Overwatch is very famous for where they introduce a new class or new character or or new specialist. It's always almost always focused on a country of origin. So,

that's great for activation and also growth for our lives game.
Let's uh let's take a moment and talk about the beta, right? I mean, that's the hot news. the beta numbers. We were looking at the graphic earlier, 600,000,
I think, was the peak CCU, which was extremely impressive. I mean, that's more than Battlefield's ever had on Steam. Of course, again, that's a complicated question as we reviewed the analytics because they were on EA's platform at its height.
So, the Steam numbers don't reflect
where they've been. And that's also higher than Call of Duty HQ, which is how Activision ended up rolling a bunch of the games together into one skew. So again, that like those are real numbers um that I
adding additional caveat to what you mentioned with the Steam data on Battlefield.
Much of the the the PC player base on COD is also split on Battle.net. So just wanted to get that
Yep.
condition out there.
Yep. Totally fair. So I guess with us all having played the beta, Mr. Sides, like what did you think? How did it play

to you? What were your impressions?
It plays great. I mean, it's it's either a love story to players or like an apology for 2042. It feels like Battlefield. It's got a destructive components that people love, especially I think the finals kind of really brought that back to life maybe like a year or so or maybe two years ago at this point. I'm thinking that it um it hits a lot of the feelings that Battlefield players wanted from 2042. There's the classes, the game feels great, there's more destruction. I mean, it it it's everything that you'd want from a Battlefield game. Um, it's defin I think this is why it's gaining the traction is because 2042 was such like a low point that this feels like amazing. Even though if this were to follow like four, I don't know if people would be as excited about it or if it were to follow three, but because it's following 2042, the station is actually ramping up the hypeness around. Besides, can I ask you a product management question also directed to Philip?
Sure.
What is the opposite of the hangover effect? Does that term exist? Uh, it

should
co cocaine. I don't know. The caffeine effect.
Well, there's kind of this there's this concept that I've talked about. I think I've talked about on here. If I say it enough, people will attribute it to me. Uh, it's essentially this kind of like lovebombing aspect
where you have to like, you know, whenever a game launches or something, you need to love bomb the players cuz then that's how you capture them and then over time you can do different things. This is Battlefield trying to love bomb the players. I don't know how Portal is going to do. Like they're obviously going down this UGC route. If it hits, it'll be I think that'll be a fantastic lease from a retention standpoint. I don't know how well it'll have work for sales, but it's definitely something that Battlefield players have wanted. Uh, and so yeah, I think they're just kind of trying to
It was in 2042,
just to be clear, like Portal Portal.
Yes. So, I mean, we should definitely spend some time talking about it. It's one of the more interesting Battlefield failures is what happened with that. It actually is a brilliant piece of technology that ripple effect that LA Studio came up with where you had chained logic that you could use to create servers. So again, you couldn't m you couldn't edit map telemetry, but you could do custom rule sets. And again, you had all the theater of theaters of war in the portal.

I see
progression problems. Anyways, we we can get there. We can get there and talk about it. I would say the the one thing I really wanted to point out is how much evolution has happened in the core gameplay and Byron and Vince's effect on the franchise. So Byron is their big hire. He's the VP, by the way.
Yeah, he he was at Call of Duty. He was VP at Call of Duty. I think he just VP of Call of Duty. I think that was his title. uh comes over is now hired by Vince. Uh it's clear Vince is head of the franchise. He's running most of it out of LA. DICE is a support studio. Rest in peace, my sweet child. Criterion's on this. They're out of England. They also did Firestorm, which was the Battlefield 5 mode for Battle Royale. And if you remember, they also did the combat vehicle combat for Battlefront 2. So like franchise has totally shifted. And a lot of like the staples that I had started seeing in Call of Duty, which were these like quality of life updates that kept happening patch after patch after patch, which I was impressed with for a core franchise were things like the battle log. So, we're looking at live footage

here, but when someone gets killed, what you'll see is an image of their body and where they got shot and where the damage came from. That was something Call of Duty added, I think 2 or 3 years ago, but it helps complete like the first person shooter loop of you learning and understanding like how you died, potentially improving. And the other thing they'll do is they'll freeze frame where the person who killed you was so you at least see where you got shot. So again, they're trying to polish the loop of Battlefield, which has been fundamentally broken and underinvested in. I would argue for the last 10 years is that the franchise just hasn't had clear direction. And I think this is about setting the franchise back on a path where it's trying to slowly polish what's already there. One more example is the body dragging. So, if you noticed in the beta, you can drag players who are downed to safety. And this was something that was actually supposed to be in 2015 and got cut because we couldn't get the animations right. Uh there was a lot of other problems with it as well. The fact that they got this in and it works pretty well. Like there was a couple glitches here and there, but that was something that was a struggle in the Frostbite engine.

They're delivering a lot of these, I would say, things that the franchise just hasn't had attention to. A quick note, what you described regarding the the systems ingrained so players could learn while they while they play. Typically in the first person quoteunquote community, those would be called arcade like shooter arcade features, things that Call of Duty was really known for. Call of Duty to this day is considered at its core an arcade shooter. And during respected to it to its time, Battlefield would be described as more like a tactical or tactical shooter in a bigger sandbox area of play. And if you want to look at from a feature set perspective, one to one using War Zone as an example, Call of Duty had to build far more features to make a war zone while Battlefield theoretically would make less features to get on par with a Call of Duty which you describe. So, it's interesting as we go through the years of watching that arms race kind of go

head-to-head to where we are now.
Why Why do you think of it as a tactical shooter? Because like I I agree that like Battlefield has been given that tactical label.
Tactic cool. Tactic cool. Not tactical. Tactic cool.
Like I I played I played Delta Force before the weekend which was an interesting Yeah. If interesting game I think it's very Chinese. It's very Chinese. It's very eastern. I mean, they just straight up copy 2042. So, so many of the elements, which also is very distinctly Chinese,
but the core gameplay, it is more, it's more brutal. It's very Chinese in that I mean, I talked to the the Delta Force Jade Studio GM, and that was something he said Chinese players, Leo said that they tend to prefer in China, but do you think Battlefield really is that that much of a difference from Call of Duty when we think about the core mechanics, especially with what you saw in the beta, which looks like they're tuning it a little more, Katie, a little bit quicker, sliding.
Pre Battlefield 6 or Battlefield pre- Battlefield 6?
Pre Battlefield 6. So pre- Battlefield

6, it was definitely its own stronger identity compared to say a Call of Duty. And I I believe that was by design. The reason for that is you never and please sides and Philip let me know if I'm totally off base here. You never want to ditch the girl that you brought that got you to the dance. You you want to keep your core players. You always want to keep your core or as much of it of your audience and then grow from there. So, it's always like I don't know the internal conversations within 2042, but it seemed to me that they were very focused on maintaining whatever core elements of the franchise into 2042. And what I see a departure within Battlefield 6 as an innovation in a good way is taking a lot of arcadey elements from say a Call of Duty while also keeping the tactic what I call again tactical cool or fantasy fantastic fantasy styled tactical elements but not too much hardcore within Battlefield

being still being there as we can see from here with the the resin on the gameplay side of things. I I I definitely think that over time Battlefield has become less tact tactical, maybe more tactical,
but I don't know if that's a reflection of where the market is going. Like when I worked on Marathon, something we got told a lot was like the game's got to be faster. Players say it's like too slow,
and it's like, well, it's trying to be at the time is like trying to be more tactical and things like that. And so you think about tactical with like slow and methodical, but even looking at this gameplay, like this is not slow and methodical. I think the tactical part of Battlefield really seem Battlefield 6 really seems to come down to the size of the maps. It's like a bigger map kind of means you have to be more uh careful in the decisions you make. You can't necessarily just run in the open field. So that's like where the tacticalness comes from. But the second to second is very arcadey. And so they're they're doing this interesting mix which I think is why a lot of players are kind of like, you know, people are saying it's like the COD, you know, it's going to kill COD this year. All these, you know,

all the the gamers. Um, it's because of the feel of this. Look at this gameplay. Really not what Battlefield historically has appeared to be. Yes, they have these elements of like healing or resing and other things that have existed in other ones, but the speed at which players are moving the TTK feels faster. I really think they're leaning more into like the arcadey feel with some Battlefield rapper, which I think it's actually working pretty well in my opinion.
No, I I agree with you. I I think that's the case. I think the franchise is sped up. If you remember, there was a bunch of like interesting mechanics that the the franchise used to play with. Like in Battlefield 5, if you remember, there were fortifications, which like started to be the thread of I think more interesting ideas about the franchise, I think, owning and embracing its own identity. And it it's just I I think we've been lost now that I'm away from DICE and I'm looking back at like the opinions I had when I was there at DICE, you know, looking at the franchise overall, kind of seeing how Call of Duty has evolved, doing much more study of the first person shooter market overall. I think we've just we we really lost not just you know our core but like growing

our core like growing all of those like all of those things which make playing Battlefield a lot of fun. Like to give you an example
Battlefield is three things in my my opinion and I think that's shared by most people and there's a million documents in EA.
It's large scale combined arms warfare. That's number one. So that means land air sea combat. That's a core part of the franchise. I think that's that's something we should talk about because it's also the most expensive part of the franchise and one that has very strange costbenefit analysis. I think there's a focus on team oriented objectives. That's something I think is remarkably different from Call of Duty which is usually individual play or focus on kill streak or kill death ratio. And then I think there's the class system which I also love to talk about which is the idea that you're going to encourage this interdependence or I think mostly what it is is just play style preference. I don't I don't think it amounts to anything, but that still is a staple of the franchise. So, it's those three things. And all those three things, by the way, are different than Call of Duty.
Those are those are opposing Call of Duty. And I'm I'm very c curious um Chris, what ground war was in Call of

Duty. So, you remember Call of Duty was like attacking everyone at one point and you there was a 64 player mode.
So, when you mentioned what Battlefield was, thank you for that. I'm going to tell you what
at least that's one person. That's one dude in style. So, so being very from my perspective being very careful careful here when it comes to Call of Duty, it has to be fun to shoot and it has to be fun to move. They both have from campaign to multiplayer to zombies. Non-negotiable as non-negotiable as non-negotiable as buttery smooth 60 fps all time. So once you have those basics down, I use McDonald's a lot in in talking about Call of Duty in the best way possible. in terms that there's a formula for a baseline Call of Duty and once a studio has demonstrated that they mastered and understand what the franchise is then they're allowed to add their own layers of innovation as and have their own studio identity and you still see that to this day like Call of Duty from IW or

Infinity Ward has a different attitude than a Call of Duty from Treyarch or Sledgehammer Games but they all have the same skeleton of it feels great to move. It feels great to shoot. There's score streaks that can exponentially increase your player fantasy in each session of a game. You don't really have that in Battlefield where and shout out to Richard Brown. Battlefield in terms of its play style is more about us. Call of Duty in its say smaller 6v6 core mode is more about me. I'm and even Bobby Cod talked about this in the past where you are the hero of an action movie in every single Call of Duty game you play that fantasy I think is very unique to what a Call of Duty player expects from a Call of Duty regardless of it sub franchise. Do you feel like although there are the team oriented and things like that, do you think that Battlefield 6 is becoming more in that sense of Call of Duty of being the hero cuz even if you look at

the from a content creator standpoint, when you look at what they play, it's rare. Well, sometimes I'm sure it's about team play, but a lot of it is about how good they are or cool things they did. What we're seeing here is a support class for Battlefield 6 open beta where their one of their functions of this class is to revive other players on the fly. You could also take out enemy players using their defibrill their their kit. That being said, I've seen more and I've had more fun playing as a support reviving my teammates and taking out enemies as a support class. In a sense, you are a hero. And I don't I wouldn't take I wouldn't say that's taking that's taking a page out of Call of Duty. It's taking a page from a Battlefield game, Battlefield 2, 20 plus years ago, namely the Japanese medic. So, if you guys played 1942 back in the early 2000s, such a fun class and that's and it's it's almost like we're going back to full circle sides where from us

to me to me to us and back and forth again. So, from what I've played thus far on the open beta for Battlefield 6, yes, it's all about the objectives. That being said, there's also opportunity for you to to just go ham and play your own fantasy shooter if you like, which is always a good thing. I do think that is a good thing for sure, but I think it removes from the like team oriented aspect. It's almost like the other players just exist to give me my rewards.
It's not necessarily they exist so I could support them. even if you play support. I feel like I just feel like six is leaning more into like the selfish player behavior that Call of Duty tends to, which I don't necessarily think is a bad thing. I see I still think it has the Battlefield rapper on it, but I think the individual play like a session or really game to game feels more selfish than it used to. I I might I might counter you from a brand perspective because this is also something that Battlefield it's the

struggle for Battlefield's identity is is what I've start to see when I look at the franchise at stake. And so if you remember in 2042 the last one there were operators.
So there were characters that you could use on the battlefield that you could you could collect very similar to you know Rainbow Six Siege I guess in some degree. You know they did have distinct gameplay. That was also the first time like for instance you could have a squad of all the same characters which got a lot of criticism as fantasy and immersion breaking.
I would also point out like that isn't a response to problems that the franchise have that we haven't talked about yet
which is that the the the game can't [ __ ] retain you know like this is a problem. It is hard for has been hard for Battlefield to find a live service and find a monetization formula that works with the game with the audience content that's retentive that isn't just map hacks. One of the things that we haven't talked about is like Battlefield engineered this DLC model, this expansion model for first-person shooters. Like Battlefield 2 was cranking these out in the early 2000s, spec ops. Like even, you know, 43 had its own expansion packs and DICE lost

lost the translation translation of live service. And honestly, I thought we accelerated it too quickly, but we we've kind of like moved there was that the hero experiment and I think this is actually moving away from that hero experiment. Like if you look at the soldier, it's just someone generic.
And I think to Chris Chris's point, you said action hero. I think what the fantasy that Battlefield provides is is definitely different than what you just mentioned. I don't think it's about action hero.
I do think there's something to the scale and about emerging from that scale. Euima and Battlefield V was one of the most successful updates of the franchise where I thought we started to find our footing again and it was about a large scale invasion of Euima that felt like you were part of something larger than yourself. That's what I think Battlefield promises. There was one thing our creative director said that I always thought was was really compelling on Battlefield 5 and and or why he thought Battlefield 1 sold the most, which is that when you look at like the back of a box for a Battlefield game, there's all this like incredible grand imagery. Like if you remember the back of the box for Battlefield 1 had

the Zeppelin in it, right? And you're like, "Oh my god, can I go in that?
Could I man that? Could I could I be a part of that?" It's not just a cutscene. And Battlefield embraces that in a way that no one else I think has to a meaningful degree. And you could do that. You could do that in Battlefield 1. You could be on a horse and, you know, cut people with a saber. There were still people in the Turkish Empire that were that were using horseback in World War I. Like those are things that I think the franchise has captured really well. The imagination and again
atmosphere.
Yep. Yep. And those are things I don't think again Call of Duty has. Mhm.
Well, a primary driver when it came to designing maps within Call of Duty, it was always about very clear sightelines. For example, the first thing a not even a competitive, but even a casual shooter does when they when they boot up an FPS game, multiplayer FPS game on their PC, they turn down all the settings low to make it perform the highest while also making sidelines very clear. It's for a

purpose. So it's but yeah you I agree with your sentiment Philip it's a different desired outcome from the player base. I was thinking too like think about like the zeppelin on the back of the box at the end of the day Battlefield in general is one of the most gorgeous games to market. I mean it has it has all the stuff you could ask for. Battlefield moments exist for a reason. Um and I think that's why I mean even the 2042 marketing video is one of my favorites ever. And I think that they're getting away with a lot of that now because of how many content creators exist that are hyped about it and playing it. They're getting a ton of free marketing from these just great videos that exist. They're so good at it. Um or I mean the game like the sandbox of the game just supports those opportunities.
While Call of Duty I feel is much more on that like you know trickshot, how cool are you? How good are you? It's kind of like the the sweet cool guy, you know. Um while while Battlefield is more of like this like creative artistic version of of war and this is why it

leads to me heavily believing that it's going to sell extremely well but I don't know if those marketing aspects really hold to the retention like you're talking about Philillip you can ride the zeppelin you get on it once you're like this is sick it's like okay I don't need to do that again you know it's like it doesn't really retain people but it it's so good on the back of the box I mean it's just perfect for them
and that is a great segue Okay. To one of Battlefield's core problems that I'd like to ask both of you about.
You know, imagine your franchise managers. Uh you have all these studios underneath you.
We know Battlefield doesn't have great retention.
What do you see that as a function of and how do you go out and try to solve that
in Battlefield 6? And so right now we're looking at the content launch evolution starting from Battlefield Bad Company, looking at the number of maps, weapons, classes, the system that they had, the type of loadout they have. general trend is that it's downward shaping
in terms of the quantity of content as well. So this would be one way to start the conversation.

So in general, not just for Battlefield, but but any game, you have to get the progression as sweet as possible to make people always want to come back to make sure that their session was worth whatever time they put into it. It could be level leveling up a character, a gun to grind out a skin to or or to fill out specific or arbitrary daily login awards to get a meta reward at the end of a season. So prog so easy answer, progression has to be a pillar of design from day one. I mean, I would do I 100% agree. I think I even think just the the skin grind in Call of Duty like this is me being biased, but uh I love it every year. that skin grind to get the gold for everything or, you know, Damascus or whatever you want to do.
I think that that aspect,
it gives it such like a I mean, at the end of the day, Call of Duty has amazing second to second, but it gives this like long-term goal that feels like you're

working towards it every time you get a kill.
Um, and I think that I don't know if I'm sure Battlefield 6 will have something. I don't remember anything in the beta that was kind of leaning that direction, but something as I say simple, it's still a lot of content. You have to make all the all the cosmetics, but simple in like a systems perspective.
Mhm.
Something like that. that I think hits so well for that audience. They really craves it.
I I think it's worth just talking about that because that again reinforces like how Call of Duty has re has continued to build on its like winners,
right? Prestiging was in Modern Warfare 4. That's one of the big turn that that franchise is when it explodes. Which by the way, Vince was on by the way. That's that's the irony of all this by the way is that Vince created Modern Call of Duty and is now trying to rebirth Battlefield 6. But they've expanded on the prestige system where you reset your progression once you reach level 50 or usually it's 55 is the main account level progression. But now you have prestige levels
and so you can get to like prestige level 12 and you're getting content along the way when you're prestiging up. And not only that, the economy has become based around that because when you prestige, remember you lose all of

your progression
and you have to reset. And so you now have these tokens which let you keep some of your stuff,
but there's a monetization hook which is the blueprint system. Yes.
Which is a bundle of weapons or attachments that you normally would earn in weapon progression as you normally shoot with the the gun and progress it.
But now that is pre-saved and almost just becomes a UX saver because I don't need to remake my [ __ ] every time I prestige. I'm a hardcore player. Might prestige 13, 14, 15 times. That's a lot of button clicking. Why not just buy a blueprint?
Mhm. And when you look at the prestige system within Call of Duty 4, also known as MW1 back in 2007, that was essentially lifted from MMOs and RPG games. It was a genre blending feature, which and there's value to that, and that can't be built upon game over game, year after year. That being said, well, just a quick shout out to a great

innovation on that system from I I believe Black Ops 2, Fresh Start. Are you guys aware of Fresh Start?
So, Fresh Start is for the players, which I guess there were enough of them. If you reach max everything and you had such a good time, you could press Fresh Start and start from day one, blanked out, zero kill, zero everything again. And that feature was pretty popular. So
like massochism,
but again it ties so progression all that ties back into the core loop of the game. If the core loop is strong, progression is something to look forward to. If the core loop is weak with a lot of friction, people don't want don't want too much too much progression mechanics in their game. So I I Yeah, go ahead.
What do you think is wrong with Battlefield's progression? Right. Let's get more specific cuz there's they're going to be the normal account level progression.
You know, you're going to be earning, you know, general, major, you know, it'll gate some features. Maybe it'll give you some some grind currency.

There's usually a class level progression system.
Um, I think there's going to be some new systems here. I think they're moving more to Call of Duty from what I saw. I don't know if you guys saw this, but there are attachment points. This is straight Call of Duty, right? And only that, it's better than Call of Duty.
Pick 100. I'm sorry. Pick 100.
Exactly. Because it's better than Call of Duty because they fractionalized it. Right. Now you can assign points to things rather than like six out of seven. Um, which let you modularize things. But I think they're trying to also deepen or at least get table stakes with their progression system cuz it's it's not just like, hey, you had a rank and hey, you had an account level. I think it's the content that the progression rewards has been relatively flat in Battlefield.
Mhm.
And now now they're modularizing more content. Like when we go back and we look at the difference between the different games, the best retaining game in Battlefield history was Battlefield 4. And what do you notice about Battlefield 4 in terms of launch content? Launch weapons, 76 launch weapons. It was an incredible volume of content. The launch maps is a little

deceiving here. It actually had one of the highest because the DLC drops were very frequent and aggressive in that game as well. And I I just think the the franchise I do think it needs to figure out what its core progression systems are because it still hasn't done that. I mean Jesus Christ, they change it every single every single game. Even I've been on like is there is there gun progression? Okay, it's a skill tree. Okay, now there's going to be class progression now. I mean, we just haven't like Call of Duty is so consistent year in and year out. It's the franchise model. Like he talked about it. Ray Ray Croc's behind there. He's like, "We're doing it. We're doing it again." Uh I I think that they they haven't had the firepower behind their progression systems and I think this is finally going to help which is just having enough studios.
Like the the manpower behind the two different franchises has been enormous in my opinion. Uh and it's gotten worse. I mean you know you might have 500 people on Battlefield Battlefield franchise some of the earlier ones and you're already looking at what a thousand to 3,000 for Call of Duty.
All hands on deck.
All hands on deck. And Call of Duty still has those threeear dev cycles because Bobby set it up that way where

you have the cascading studios that get you yearly releases. So just look at the logos here between 2042 and Black Ops 6.
There must be what 14 studios for for for Activision and there's six for Battlefield.
The House of COD.
The house the House of COD. The House of COD indeed. What What's wrong? What do you fix? What would I fix for Battlefields Battlefield in general? Like
in terms of progression systems like you said one thing they could do is like they got to get progression right. How do they get progression?
Rewarding by making it rewarding. That's how you get it right. By like having for for like coming to the table in every meeting in every sync about this from the product side to the design side to the engineering side to the u UIUX side everyone has let's let's take a very first principles approach of the we value the player and we value the player's time. Okay. Therefore, every

time they touch our game or or product, every time they every for every session, they end the session either feeling happy that they played, rewarded, or incentivized to play longer, and we start from there. It could be different for like when it comes to Battlefield, I haven't I don't remember much about 2042. That being said,
it does
20 from my memory, 2042's core gameplay was good. I had a good time. I I remember I remember remember having a good time playing it. But when when I compare that to my memories of playing insert a COD, any COD, I was I I remember like December 2013 playing Ghost for I I remember playing I remember what game I was playing, what mode, and what gun I was playing for. for in December 2013, Call of Duty Ghost. I was trying to get the Honeybadger and I was trying very hard to do whatever it took to get that gun.

I remember that. It's very it's very it's a core memory of mine and that's unique for a game like Call of Duty because of how all their systems are ingrained for that progression style. And Call of Duty is really one of those games where people buy, you know, November or October and they play throughout the year and they only stop to play the next Call of Duty. Typically, some people just stay for the next two years. But Call of Duty is very unique in that because of their of the many progression systems and rewards you get and and and the fun of the core loop. It's Call of Duty. I don't think Call of Duty gets enough credit actually now that now that I'm thinking about it of what it does right. So to answer your question of what Battlefield could then do is I think they're doing it a lot of so Battlefield 6 has a lot of DNA from Call of Duty. Their dire franchise their franchise director of product is great name by the way Cody Corona

and he's the director of product franchise management based in LA along with Byron bead GM along with another great name Enrico Bongo who is also an act who's who also came from Activision Call of Duty is now at EA EA I believe so you have you have the leadership structure there to really from the top down set the expectations of a baseline of not just progression but overall I think product management which Call of Duty is very good at and also I think underrated when it comes to when people talk about product management of in games now being exercised at the highest level at a franchise level for Battlefield 6. So based on that lineup, I'm very confident that they'll they'll do something that will be head and shoulders above what we've seen before for Battlefield. We've been on people is what I'm trying to say.

Mr. Sides, what do you think?
Yeah, I mean I don't I don't have enough kind of insight into the, you know, the kind of leadership and like corporate workings on that side. I think I mean the the math makes sense is kind of the thing that when when you look at it now it just
uh you hope you hope the ma you hope you know you didn't mess up along the way in that equation but it makes sense and I think that that's from my perspective as somebody who hasn't worked on like these specific games like you do have. Um my perspective is like that's kind of the best route you can go. Like when we're playing the Battlefield 6 beta there may be complaints but they're not really complaints about the core. their complaints about more of the ancillary things that oh maybe I missed this or I wish it was this way but it's not no one's really complained at least I have not really seen it or at least the majority of people haven't talked about like the core has a problem but when you looked at 2042 you know the fact that you could like in fact you could have the same class in the whole squad that was a massive you know massive problem from a sentiment standpoint for battlefield players um and so there was

core problems back then and I think that what we're now what we're seeing now is like there doesn't really seem to be that core problem so You're right. Putting that progression on top they have to hit right cuz it's like they got the core that'll get you the sales that'll get you a month of gameplay or whatever. But how do you get now going on forward while also competing with COD which I mean regardless of how you feel the amount of content they release is is just unbelievable. I mean it is like you can't even fathom the number of things they are releasing every two months. It is overwhelming to think about. And so I don't know how they're going to solve that problem regardless of their progression track. They may have good progression. Again, that's good for early on retention and maybe some sort of late game prestige system, but the amount of content they have to compete with is just mind-boggling. I mean, when we were doing analysis like of Marathon and looking at COD, they're just a juggernaut. I mean, the amount of stuff they release is insane.
So, let's talk about the product management aspect, which I think is really interesting. Also, economist

team, that doesn't get enough credit, obviously. I don't know how you could leave that out.
Intertwined. Design, econ, e economics, product, they're all intertwined.
So, I guess I'm curious for each of you. How would you reallocate resources? Like, maps has always been what Battlefield has gone towards. I feel like that's a dead paradigm.
Uh, guns, you know, battle pass, cosmetics. I mean, we know what the playbook is,
but how are you going to relatively allocate resources to get the most bang for your buck and retention for the Battlefield franchise? Hey, are you building a game, launching an app, or considering an acquisition? Well, in that case, Deconstructive Fund Consulting is here to help you out. We do everything from market research to go to market strategies to live ops optimization and due diligence. We're trusted by some of the most beloved game development companies, makers of tools and tech, as well as some of the most renowned investors. Now, if you are building, launching or buying, don't do

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industry-leading monetization features, seamless in-game payment integration, and a robust SDK. While 70% of top grossing games already have web stores, the ones scaling the fastest are doing it with AppCharge. Ready to transform good into great? Learn more at appcharge.com. [Music] Using CODA as as an example again, another another baseline or matter of fact for every Call of Duty is that there is a main character in every game. And that main character is always the gun because that is what the that takes up like half of the screen sometimes. It's in every game mode. It's in every game. And people talk about their guns in Call of Duty like their like their favorite character in Street Fighter. Oh, this gun's great. This gun's overpowered. And on top of that, there's ways to customize each gun. Pick 10, pick what you will, and also play styles. So

going into Battlefield, I would be curious to see how much they can overindex on the on not not the gun play, but the focus on the gun and gun play itself without while also keeping the core of what made Battlefield Battle Battlefield, which is of course the big maps, big teams, formations, vehicles, Guns. Again, I'm biased here coming from COD. Guns are guns have they they have the most attention. They have the most people see the guns the most. People use guns. There's a there's nar situation where where people don't use guns. So, the dumb answer here, Philip, and sides more guns the better. I for sure agree. Uh more guns better. especially just looking at like if you just want to take a data point of Battlefield 4. Um, but

I I don't know how that translates to Battlefield when a part of it is classes that are meant to not use their guns.
Mhm.
Like the support system. I mean, of course, they use their weapons, but you know, their like core identity is that they are they are um saving the people who are using their guns. uh engineer into some extent too where it's like their core identity is ensuring you know that players can continue to use uh you know vehicles or something. So I think that they come in run into an interesting problem where COD is you know simple in that perspective. Um you know it's just the gun that's all you need there's no other things going on. Um but Battlefield runs into this mix where it's like the gun is sick but also it's like I want to res people you know that's my fantasy is like supporting the team
um in some fashion. I don't know if Call of Duty really has that like support fantasy as like Battlefield does. And I think there may be some difficulty there in the way like you cohort players. Like there's obviously players who love the

weapons and that's all they care about. But if you're releasing like a cosmetic, do you lower the pool of audience that is willing to find that one interesting compared to COD where it's like everybody will find this interesting who uses this weapon?
I I think remember there are some fundamental challenges in Battlefield when we think about just weapons. So, you have class restrictions, which is defined by your primary weapon, and people don't switch classes. Very rarely do we see that happen. I can tell you that with a great degree of confidence. Yes, some elder players do, but by and large, that's not the behavior we observe. You pick one class and you go with it, which means you divide by four, which is also behind 2042, trying to move to Call of Duty's open classes. No restrictions, everything customizable, RPG go, right? And Call of Duty Interesting has been like adding a little bit more, especially we were talking about like continuing improve where like now you get bonuses if you have three of the same type of perks which is really fun. But they continue to like embrace the loadout RPG aspect. I mean last time I counted it was like 17 30 different choices you can make on a Call of Duty character. But like these are things

that when we talk about like you know the the class situation you were mentioning Chris at the beginning of the call returning your core. They're trade-offs, right? And so this is one of the roadblocks I see is now what do you do from a design perspective? You just divide it by four. And not only that, what about vehicles, right? That's been something that always has been a problem on the franchise that that's your fifth class. There's some people who just do planes because it's it's a high barrier to entry. Just do tanks. What do you do with those? Do you do you make tank skins? Uh do I make more vehicles or do I just say [ __ ] it, you know, and like let's go for TAM and just build assault weapons? You get rid of the class system?
So I I wouldn't get rid of the class system or core feature of Battlefield. I would be curious to see, at least for when it comes to the release of Battlefield 6, if there would be bundles you could either direct purchase or unlock that would include X skin for all vehicles that the players could then customize on a onetoone basis.
I again I don't have any insider information on this, but I'll be curious to see if that happens. So long as players could number one work towards

them, number two add or not add or apply at their own discretion to give them that agency. Yeah, but you're right. You you're always dividing by class and by player style throughout throughout the process. So it is a problem. Not not a problem, but it is it is a challenge for the franchise to keep its core
with minimal trade-offs.
Can I can I offer something else here which I think is interesting.
Portal, we're talking about Portal. They're the UGC platform. It's coming back, baby. It's come back with a bang. Not only that, it's not going to be like custom scripted. It's going to be in an open-source game engine.
Go dot go dot.
Do you think that this franchise shouldn't think about live service in the way that Call of Duty is as like a factory and instead should be Steam Mod Workshop, UGC, Steam Marketplace? Like what about embracing those aspects? Which by the way, Delta Force
Mhm. War, War Thunder, like all these games out of nowhere just started having marketplaces, which by the way, EA has experience with with the with FIFA.

Should what if they what if they didn't go down the normal, you know, that that route, cosmetic, all that normal stuff, and and instead
went more Steam PC type marketplace transaction? Do you think there's something there more UGC like embracing those aspects, throwing out the normal playbook? are c can you would you lump in Counterstrike Ghost skins in that bucket as well though and sides? I mean, I think if if they go down the route, I mean, the, you know, CS:GO skins are really just about the the loot boxes and then getting there. Like, if they go down that route, sure. I think that I I think that betting on UGC is of course never a bad thing, but it does require players that are willing to freely work to support the game. Um, which usually means you need a massive amount of DAOU to get the small percentage that does it. And so there there's an interesting I think there's an interesting kind of

competition here of having a premium title with UGC just pure down to the pure amount of players you need. I don't know maybe they're going to have a spin-off that is like free to play like like War Zone is for COD. I have no idea. But I think that there runs into really challenging issues of who are the ones making it and then how do you support them and what is the balance of supporting them versus supporting the game? Are you going to have to do both? That becomes like extremely overwhelming. And so I as a player I'm excited for Portal as a business model. It's a it's like the risk they are taking. I think in their live services I don't think I think that they've done the analysis and said we cannot compete with Call of Duty's live service cadence.
I'm I have to imagine that that occurred and so they went another route to try to keep players. And I think that it's kind of one of the only options because once you build the tools, of course there's still support needed, but you're not having to build the bespoke content by yourself anymore. you're relying on other players who enjoy that which is kind of the which is the hope. Um but you'd have to get the players to actually do it and keep them.

Mhm. Yeah. I think to your point sides I will also link in what like what is the incentive structure for people to create on Portal aside from flexing their creative muscles. I am personally biased towards any UGC tools for any major game. I I still to this day have great memories of Warcraft 3 and their map editor. Like just to be clear and let it be known that the game mode of the Ancients came from the map editor of Warcraft 3 which is has now you know birthe the mobile genre which makes in like a lot of money every year. So, of course, of course, the romantic in me hopes and thinks that that could happen again for something like Portal and Battlefield 6. That said, it has to be easy for not just players to create an Portal. It has to be easy

for the players to then discover what's worth playing and give feedback to the creators and to other players that, hey, this mode is good. you should play more of it on top and linking all that together is like is it worth players to make content aside from the joy of doing it on Battlefield 6? I don't know what the answer is to that. I have some ideas why but that's for another conversation. of the questions that would really really need to be addressed to get the to get the mass and surge of people creating quality content on portal to really help with that with retention on the UGC side of things. Like to condense that further, the upside of things going right is way too high for them not to do this to be clear. And I I think outside of that part, I have a massive negative sentiment towards any game that hasn't

launched yet talking about how they're going to do amazing live services.
It's just always said live service is it's either a marketing term at this point because from a product standpoint, it seems what do we even mean by this word anymore? My inherent bias is that whenever I, you know, read about what they're talking about next live service, blah blah blah, I just don't believe them. Mhm.
And I just don't and I I'm hop to be proven wrong because I love Battlefield. Like I want to play it. I want to be I want to be part of that community for a long time. I just don't believe it and I don't see how they get there.
It's exactly what we saw in like consumer insight surveys. Like you know I remember flying out to Germany and like you know you're behind the interrogation glass and you're actually seeing someone interact with the fans and that was one of the things that really popped out. The word life service has become toxic. It means yeah it's it's become dirtied. It becomes a future promise. It's things that I want now. I I completely agree with you on that. I will say on the UGC portal side, I really disagree with Chris, like people create to create. I think we see this on all UGC platforms. Uh there wasn't a large financial incentive to create and

for example something like Dreams or Little Bigplet, but we see that happen all the time and you'll see the same thing in Battlefield Portal because we know it already happened, right? Battlefield Portal already shipped in 2042. And I think there
again the tools were limited. You weren't affecting geometry, you were affecting rule sets and that is different than geometry, but I still think you saw a community there were trying to figure it out and ultimately make something. Linux exists. I'd like I'd point that out. Like these things these things do persist.
I think Portal needs to be a really important part of the strategy. Like I still look at Portal as the counterpositioning to Call of Duty.
Like when we think about Call of Duty, you know, it's the formula, right? You've got all the different franchise aspects and you kind of like change the skin or the mod. And that also is something that Battlefield has had a problem with. Like when we look at the Steam PSU curves, there's still people playing Battlefield 5 or 2042, whatever theater of war they want, right? That's where a lot of the strong preferences come from. And this is an attempt to unify it, which Call of Duty has been trying to do as well. Now it's Call of Duty HQ. Everything's under a unified launcher. The engine started to be aligned. And so I think that's where all these executives heads are at. Even look at like the Battlefield homepage for

Battlefield beta. This is straight from Call of Duty. This is what Call of Duty launched with War Zone. It's the Netflix UI with the different modes with the tiles, which by the way is very console-centric. Doesn't work too well on PC, but this is straight up. This is a straight up franchise portal, right? That's the dream. And now I can upsell you on all the different SKs cuz now you have a single point of entry, which is again what they do in Call of Duty. To your point, they've they've integrated and unified all these different things. And I think that is still the overriding challenge for these franchises when they think about their next step is how you unify all these different experiences under one continuous live service. There will be an end to $60 Call of Duty box products. I mean, War Zone War Zone happened. I'm still crazy. It's still crazy that thing shipped, but they shipped to freeto-play battle royale to extend the franchise. Um, but I I think like that is also like, okay, when do we when can we stop doing box products at some point? Feels natural now. they have an off point and I think Battlefield's trying to figure out. Remember the rumors that like a battle royale is going to come out free to play for Battlefield 6. That seems like the wrong

strategy to me. But I think Portal seems I would argue is more important this this franchise thesis that both of these franchises are trying to deal with.
Can I wrap what you beautifully said, Philip, in terms of what play that would be? It's essentially a platform play. They want to own a platform, therefore owning the users. That is where the the value is. Aside from IP, aside from great first-party deals, if you could own a platform like a Fortnite or a Roblox, that is mega bucks to put it into layman terms. So having a COD HQ or having I don't know what what it would be called in Battlefield that is in line with what I would call a platform play of owning the platform, owning the users, owning the market or that market,
which is good. Call of Duty has the head start here. I mean, I think this is why Call of Duty at the end of the day will be the winner for a long time. They were the kind of first to get to this

platform aspect. And I know that other games are chasing it. But the only reason why COD can do it is because they have like 20 some odd years of stepping on every game over and over, increasing every game over and over and over, trying to enter it from fresh start. Granted, Battlefield 6 is not like a fresh start, but from a platform perspective, I I feel like it is. It's going to be incredibly expensive. It's going to be it's just risky. And when I think about when I think about, you know, EA historically, they're not as, you know, they're more riskadverse than than other companies. And so I'm not sure how that actually gets executed on their side.
I want to I want to throw I want to throw an oddball to each of you
that we're all they're all aware of. Mobile is very interesting. So on the Call of Duty side, you got Call of Duty Mobile, which was the unified engine launching on mobile. Same experience, dual skew, cross progression, complete and utter failure, died in 6 months. You have the Chinese one, which of course had again American product management, former scope PM, Mr. Matt Lewis, which has been in a really strong place. Battlefield Mobile

existed was industrial toys and has been cancelled. Is there anything to mobile in this conversation? Is there any mobile part of this conversation or can we just really think about everything for both Call of Duty and Battlefield? Is there anything they can do with mobile to enhance this or to subtract it? Does it play any role whatsoever? So COD Mobile by all accounts is a success primarily due and I'm biased here primarily due to the China dev teams really understanding of how to get the most out of low demand devices. Typically when there's a lot of reasons to fail in a mobile game, but one of the one of the pit one of the pitfalls of the many pitfalls is is the assumption from developers in general thinking that if I could have if I could put a high definition experience on mobile that will be the differentiator of my game. Not the case.

mo the more demand the more graphically demanding a game is on mobile, the lower the battery life is and the and the the that risk there will not will keep people from playing your games coupled with the graphical requirements that you need for newer devices therefore cutting your audience even further down. So Unity as you mentioned being used for Call of Duty Mobile very flexible engine it scales on on devices. Call of Duty Mobile has shown to stand the test of time, not just on the core 6v6 game mode for Call of Duty, but also having its own battle royale modes as well. I do believe it it it should be a goal for any franchise to have a a mobile a mobile version of their game out there that's successful. that could either help players from to to enter their ecosystem of their IP or allow people on the go who are fans of the IP to all to maintain contact

with the IP that they love and mobile is the best place to do it. So I got a couple couple things actually speaking of COD Mobile. Eric Arai, he's the current director of product on Marathon. Eric worked on COD Mobile a lot. If you ever want to talk about COD Mobile, highly recommend talking to him or having him on
shooter monthly coming soon.
He's great. The thing thing I wonder about mobile is we talk about how you know we can use mobile so that when players are not at their computer and not at their console they can like still remember the game or still be engaged with the game.
I sort of wonder if that like I don't know how much of that I believe because there are plenty of ways to interact with a game especially from a community standpoint when you're out and about that doesn't require playing the game.
When I think about mobile one I'm just extremely pessimistic. So that that's like my bias here. I don't I I look at if there was a Battlefield um God, not even to bring this word back, the companion apps they had back in the day.
Elite, I remember that.
Rest in peace. That was a subscription service too at one point.
But I think that like if you can use mobile as an acquisition

source for the mainline game that is a decent strategy compared to really betting on mobile being its own profitable business. Of course, it is possible if you wanted to do that to like focus on it being profitable. But I think just from a pure risk standpoint, that's how I would look at a mobile mobile perspective. Is it just an acquisition source to get them on mainline? Um, that may be a little bit also too much of a western perspective. And so there there's definitely like this is me really thinking about like western gamers, not necessarily eastern. And so I'm unsure about on the eastern side if they if that's even a concept. What's the concept that you don't not sure if it's eastern? like like this is a very western perspective of like using the mobile app as the acquisition source for the premium product.
While I don't think that one I don't know like how well premium games do in more of like Apac countries and I don't know if that is like a similar concept where you know a player could play on mobile in Apac that would then lead them to buy it on PC.
That just seems like a funnel either. I mean, if you product management this

out, it's just like from mobile to to purchase, it's like, wow,
for sure. But it's one of those things where it's like, how do you justify the effort of making a mobile game? And if you have to if you have to prove profitability within the skew, it's a totally different argument than if you can somehow say there's a halo effect from a marketing acquisition standpoint and you can use that as a justification for the mobile skew.
That's fair. I I I've actually been curious that there's been very little effect. I mean, Call of Duty Mobile doesn't seem to have hurt the annual Call of Duty releases by any measurable degree. Uh, which I which I think is interesting. And not only that, still has a pretty strong Western audience. Obviously, it's huge in China,
but it's also successful in the West, which is why I thought Battlefield Mobile was worth pursuing.
By the way,
I still I agree with you. I still believe that Battlefield Mobile is should be pursued.
I think it should, too. I mean, I think Apex also was enough of a proof point. It's unfortunate how that ended. Uh, a lot of internal drama we could talk about. Uh, that's sad, but like those were high quality games that seem like

good proof of concepts. I wouldn't say proof of concepts, they were real. It's just sad that they've it's another reminder that EA's put this franchise aside and Apex has really been the cat's meow for the last couple years. I think that's that's what's put Battlefield on the on the back burner, I think, in many regards is just Apex has been so dominant. I mean, they they're spinning up multiple studios for Apex. They already have, right? I mean, there was this huge Madison, Wisconsin announcement, which Call of Duty also has
some studios at. Yep. Vancouver. Yeah, man. [ __ ] There is really no mobile connection. That just like seems weird not to talk about mobile. It's like the elephant in the room.
I know.
Mobile is where the money is really.
I mean, Delta Force is doing well. I mean, again, China,
but that's a dual skew, too. That's a true dual skew.
Mhm. And and quick aside on Delta Force, there's other factors at play, of course, but even during last week's amazing open beta for Battlefield 6, the Delta Force numbers on Steam at least seemed almost unaffected. It's almost like they're a different audience.
Well, I mean, Delta Force numbers seem unaffected by anything to where I'm a

little suspicious. And I do wonder if there's some bot activity with the marketplace or little Chinese bot farm. I don't know. How do you guys look at Delta Force and China and some of the other games we didn't get to talk about here? Hell at Loose, Squad, Postcryum. Think about these scale shooters.
Mhm.
I mean, they've they've kind of just existed. I mean, they all just seem to be operating in their own world.
Mhm. There's like steam steam mills sim guys and then there's like Battlefield and Delta Force is its own category. It all seems like everyone's happy.
I think there's definitely space within the FPS like market to have those games. I think when we're talking about like Battlefield and COD, that's like the top,
you know, and so it's like it's a different level of competition. Like if Call of Duty had 100,000 DA or uh you know CCU for, you know, a few months, that would be devastating. But when we look at like Delta Force, it's like, oh, that's pretty good. So, it's like it's just a different world. I don't know if it's necessarily a different audience, per se. I'm sure there's overlap, but there is at least space for those titles to exist. And also, I don't I really only play Delta Force for the Extraction

mode. I'm one of the weird ones, but it has both. And so, I I think that that allows a couple different audiences there to exist, too. And also, Extraction is just kind of more core even in that game.
Mhm.
I agree with Sides over there. The FPS market, there's always room. Like, I'm looking at Steam charts right now. the top six top six of the top seven games are all FPS's but they're all a bit different and when it comes to Delta Force Delta Force there's a lot there's something for everyone in Delta Force to the point where I'm a big believer of finding a niche and sticking with it. But Delta Force has been able to have almost like a buffet of modes for any FPS fan. If you like extraction, there's a decent extraction mode. If you like, if you want a a large scale sandbox, we have that. If you want an intimate 6v6, we have that as well. And it's free to play.
Well, hold on. You Well, hold on. You skip the best parts. What if you want loot boxes? What if you want chase

items? I mean, I'm serious. I'm like, I want those mechanics. Like, we used to have battle backpacks, battle packs. You remember like all that? Call of Duty used to have this, too. I mean, there's still RNG in these franchises, but I I think that's a leg up the Chinese devs have over us. They don't really give a the West doesn't have pitchforks, right? Because Reddit knows that the Chinese devs don't give a [ __ ] about them. And so they don't know they don't know how to put their pitchforks against they don't know how to use their agenda to whip them. Whereas the West is always listening. Community managers apologetic affected by this.
And so they can just go in and build these mechanics that again don't just make money. I would argue are engrossing and engaging. And to to piggyback off what you mentioned, not only is the game so robust with content at the time of this conversation, I know if I log in next week, there'll be even more content.
Yeah, Delta Force is insane, too.
Yes.
So, so not only does it have a lot of content there, there's always new content because China, they know it's all about the content. you need more content along with systems, but it's

it's a constant thing with them and they understand that. They don't see it as a treadmill. They just see it as the name of the name of the game. I think there was like there was like a there was a fork in the road. Western devs were how do we solve the content treadmill? You know how many meetings I've been in talking about how do we solve the content treadmill while the east was like let's run, let's go. And like you can see the disparity on a live service standpoint. When you look at like eastern live services, they are just
a million years further than western life services is an exception here. COD is pretty incredible. But outside of COD, it's really these games are yeah, every 3 months we'll have one new map, five weapons. Like that's not that's not a live service anymore. That just does not define the word anymore. You really got to look to what the East is doing. I mean, they are just killing it. Granted, I don't know how expensive that would be in the West. you know, western dev is very expensive and so I'm not sure if what the uh the P&L would look like,
but it's something that they they took with and just ran with it while we tried to solve it and we failed. We failed

like miserably at it. You were at Capital Games, right?
Mhm.
Capital Games, their Star Wars games, I think, did a great job of kind of countering or having an answer for that content treadmill by by from a systems perspective. Can you talk a bit more about that from from what you remember about that time of your Yeah, I mean one of the one of the great things about you know Galaxy of Heroes was that every character we launched essentially expanded the progression by more than the cost of the character. And so if we launched a charact we were I mean there was one year where we launched 60 characters in a year was actually we ran into diminishing returns but every single character that that we add essentially adds like another month or two of engagement for really not it was a lot of effort and it became more difficult over time as you get more characters but for the most part the gear system and I mean this isn't unique right this was all taken from like heroes charge and stuff from back in the day but you know the the gear system the ability system we just kept adding to that and every character just sat on top

of it. And so if you were a core player and engaged in the core loop and you wanted to collect every character, it just constant was feeding into it. Granted, it still we I would still argue it was a content treadmill. Like it did rely on new content. It had good systems, but it definitely relied on new content for elder players and also a lot of bespoke content, raids, territory battles, those things were big bespoke pieces of content. Then once they were out, they kind of ran on their own and were really supported by systems. But to get them built in the first place was a lot of a lot of work. Games live service was we had it down to a tea. It was awesome. I still remember it.
Yeah. I I remember being impressed by Oh, wow. It was almost like a spreadsheet change at it was it was so impactful from a small change to the gameplay experience. So So uh firm handshake from me. Thank you. Appreciate it.
Is there an FPS equivalent?
I got to get back to you on that. nothing comes to mind.
I you don't have power progression. That changes things radically. I think it has

to be about mastery at some level. And I think honestly that's where a lot of squad RPGs have like started to end up as like, oh [ __ ] we we need more core gameplay. The power progression is interesting. It gets you a long way. I've actually spent a lot of time with Clash L recently. That franchise is interesting in that they basically have tripled down on the RPG mechanics and actually have pushed aside some of the CCG mechanics. But again, even for Galaxy of Heroes, from my understanding, like there's still a meta around which characters you want to level up, which ones are best against which other ones, like there still is
there still there still are strategic choices. Like when I look at Battlefield and we talked about the content problem, I still think of that in round progression stuff you were talking about earlier in terms of killstreaks that I think they've really missed out on. And if you remember, they they did add an inround progression mechanic to this beta. They had this three tier level system you get with each of your character in round you will go from it's a field spec. That's what it is. It's got three different tiers. I'm very curious if they're going to live ops this. But I think what's zero marginal cost is when you do stat changes. How can we take the existing rule set if

it's flexible enough and basically just bundle that into a piece of content and really it's just a JSON config I think is a really interesting place for the franchise to explore. So let's see let's see where these combat medic things go. stat based changes. You can pull this off in a first-person shooter. I mean, again, the attachment system is that it's pluses and minuses with some textures. And when you go, what was it? The promod tuning system and Call of Duty, we haven't talked about that. That's an incredible endgame system that it's got very little attention, but this idea that you can really tune an individual weapon beyond the attachments, even more particular. Again, not worse or better, trying to be horizontal. I think those are things I hope the franchise explores more. I I I'm with you guys on like the tone of the conversation. This thing's got to go out and [ __ ] sell copies and win back the core. Uh, that's the first thing it's got to do. I think it'll probably fall down on the live service because again, this is the first iteration from Vince and Byron and let's see how they do over time. It's a marathon, not a sprint and this franchise has got a long way to go. Yeah. And I I think as we were talking

about like what FPS's do this, I would argue that like Destiny actually does a decent job here. I don't think it's as good as something like a mobile systems game like Galaxy of Heroes, but every weapon they drop because the perks are randomized and all this, like every weapon they release adds a lot of hours to gameplay if a player wants to grind out that weapon because of random roles. And so I I do think that Destiny actually does a pretty good job here of like treating their weapons almost as classes in a way or like as characters in Galaxy of Heroes. But outside of that, that's kind of the only Well, granted, I worked at Bungie, but that was the only one that like jumped jumped out at me that I think it does a pretty decent job.
Gentlemen, should we should we close it with a final question?
Sure, let's do it.
Like, if there was one thing you could tell Byron, one piece of feedback you give Byron after playing the beta that you'd like to see changed, what would it be, big or small? So I I have a
you got a direct line with them.

No, no, I actually have a a direct answer for that. So one of my favorite Battlefields was BF3, namely because of the rush mode. I would try very hard. I would put as much effort as I can to make the rush mode for BF6 as onetoone as the rush mode for BF just because the people who if and to anyone who's worried about Oh, that's the same thing. Yeah. Yeah, they're all over 40 now. There is a generation of players who've never played Battlefield 3 rush mode. So for rush mode for Battlefield 6 and beyond one to one BF3 rush mode, it will be the bees knees and it could be a core mode for BF6.
I dig it.
Finally goes back to some of the stuff you were saying Chris around the progressions and reward structure.
Something that I've I've heard so many times in so many meetings. It's like, oh, we're going to have this progression system and it's going to have rewards. And then you say, "Well, what are the rewards?" Like, "Oh, we don't know yet. We'll figure that out, you know, once we get the progression system in." And then

you're stuck in this like hell hole of having progression with no way to give them anything and breaking economies. So, like my thing is if they can figure out what is that very straightforward bar goes up, I feel good progression outside. I mean, love, they have level, but it's like level is almost irrelevant. Everybody has level. Level progression is not unique. They need something there that is makes me feel good when the bar goes up. And I don't think that they really have that yet. And that's like my I think for live services in general, that's the number one thing is like what is the bar going up that makes me feel good? And then what do I get for making that bar go up? And I don't see what that really is. At least in the beta. I'm sure they've got stuff that they're not showing us yet, but at least in the beta, I don't see what that is. And if it's just like unlocking weapon attachments again, it's like, okay, I I this just not that's not interesting anymore. what older CODs were very famous for and what enabled older CODs to really have a very high conversion rate from a beta to a full price purchase of a game was when

they did what's called a carryover where whatever progression you made from the beta would be carried over if you bought the game in this first week.
So just from a sales perspective that would be very powerful. Just throwing that out there as well. That would be like
they did transfer you do transfer progress from this beta. They did have an infographic with that by the way. Poorly poorly communicated in game and I think the idea of making conditional on sales is very interesting.
Save your progress. Now
uh on on my aspect like I still think the path they're going down on like getting the core gameplay right and like fine-tuning things that have never been quite functional is what I love most about this iteration of the game. So, give you another example we didn't get a chance to talk about, but when you're selecting
where you want to spawn, you remember there's this big overhead map. It's one of the dice staples. It's one of the most impressive things Frostbite can do. Give you an overtime real 3D rendered image of the map. Incredibly impressive technically and also let you assess the battlefield and decide where you want to spawn. Now, when you click on one of your units or one of your squad members,

you'll actually see like a battle cam from their first person mode. It looks like something out of Jarhead. It looks like almost it looks like you know body cam footage but also let you assess the situation and whether or not I want to spawn there or if like I'm going to die in like 3 seconds. So it solves all these different problems like love stuff like that. What I would ask them to do is to continue to build that in terms of squad cohesion which is something that I think the franchise again we talk go back to the original part this this is what I think Battlefield has lost is reinforcing its squad. I think the land thing I actually think is not what the franchise should rest on. I actually think resting on the squad is a much more exciting direction for the franchise. And so I'd like to see something very simple. Some sort of notification when I'm out of range of my fellow squad members. The whole the thing they got to solve is how you can keep squads together. How it's incentivized for them to move together. What is the systems design? Dying within a certain radius of my squad member gives me experience points. I would say any small thing that he can do to try to increase squad cohesion I think is a nice aspect to start to tune things and start to move in that more positive core

squad direction. Gentlemen, any final words? Anything we like to say? Anything you want to go out with?
It's it's going to be a great year for shooters.
Yeah.
From Battlefield to COD to Arc Raiders, it's going to be and with Marathon also upcoming, it's going to be a great six months of banging shooters. So, I'm very happy to see that as a shooter fan myself. I hope it grows the overall shooter audience and I hope it gives a lot more even more lights more fires for other publishers to make even more shooters. Shooters are a very it's a big market bigger than I think people care to realize
the biggest genre.
Mhm. Yeah,
agreed with all that. I mean as a play selfishly as a player I want all the shooters as a from a business perspective I would be very nervous about releasing a shooter in the next like three years. Our guests today have been Mr. Christopher Anjos. Mr. Christopher Anjos, where can people find more of you?
On LinkedIn. If you just search Christopheros on LinkedIn or Google

Google it. I'm It's a It's a rare name. I'm sure it pop up.
We'll put a link in the description.
Oh.
To your LinkedIn, which by the way, you got content popping off.
You got video content. You got jazz music. You got the whole kitten kaboodleoodle.
Mr. Sides, where can people find more of you?
Find more of me? I don't do a lot of LinkedIn nor social media, but uh I do have a consulting company called Seaside Gaming Consulting. So, you can email me at sesides@ seaside gaming consulting. You can see where the name came from. And other than that, I'm working on some side projects that I'll be getting out in uh pretty shortly.
And we'll also have a link to your LinkedIn and your website consulting website in the description.
A website for a game I'm working on that I could probably do better.
Oh, even pre-order?
No, no pre-order. It's essentially a daily game. It's like a dull like a Wordle and and those. It's a daily game but it's a old school platforming level every day. So every
day you know what using Unity, you know,
and uome.

Yeah. I got a good buddy of mine who is a who's been helping me out. So yeah.
Uh we should definitely include a link to that.
Sure. Yeah, I'll share it out. It's called The Simpler Times.
Oh, very cool.
That's the website.
And I'm Phil. I'm on the DJ Instructor Fun podcast. For better or for worse, you can find me there. Until next time, you did it. You made it to the end of the episode. As a fan of the show, it would help us out if you'd subscribe and leave us a review on the podcast service of your choice. Those stars and likes, while small action on your part, mean a lot to us and help to grow the show. More importantly, are you a member of the Deconstructor of Fun Slack group? If you have five years or more of games industry experience, go to deconstructorofund.com/slack and apply to join. Join the games industry best professional community filled with peers always willing to lend a hand or subscribe to our newsletter to get all the latest insights from the deconstructor of fun content creators. Thanks for listening.