In a social media post, Activision Blizzard has said it expects to “begin adding games into Game Pass sometime in the course of next year”.
We all knew it was coming, we just weren’t sure when. Microsoft’s long-in-gestation acquisition of Activision Blizzard – which was first heralded back in January 2022 – is finally nearing the end stages, and that frees the way for Activision’s games to be added to Microsoft’s Game Pass subscription service.
Now, Activision Blizzard has given an indication of when that might happen. “As we continue to work toward regulatory approval of the Microsoft deal, we’ve been getting some questions whether our upcoming and recently launched games will be available via Game Pass,” the company said in a post on X (Twitter). “While we do not have plans to put Modern Warfare® III or Diablo IV into Game Pass this year, once the deal closes, we expect to start working with Xbox to bring our titles to more players around the world. And we anticipate that we would begin adding games into Game Pass sometime in the course of next year.”
So even though the Activision Blizzard deal could potentially be finalised as early as next week, it sounds like we’ll have to wait until 2024 to play games like Call of Duty and Diablo on Game Pass.
There’s a slight wrinkle in all this, however, in that none of these Activision Blizzard games will be available for cloud streaming over Game Pass. In a concession to the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority to get the deal approved, Microsoft has agreed to hand over the streaming rights for Activision Blizzard games to Ubisoft. So if you want to play Call of Duty via cloud streaming – rather than downloading the game on Game Pass – you’ll have to use the streaming service Ubisoft+ instead.
Read more: The small print of the Activision Blizzard deal contains a requirement to support emulators
