I recently sat down with the General Manager of Call of Duty Esports at Activision, Daniel Tsay, during the DreamHack Birmingham Major of the Call of Duty League. It was an eye-opening interview that uncovered plenty about the state of the Call of Duty esports scene, including a desire to get much deeper into the European market.
Towards the end of the interview, I posed a question about the lengthy off-season that hits the Call of Duty League every year, with things typically wrapping up in June or July and not starting again until as late as January, in some cases.
Daniel Tsay has a solution for that gap.
Watch Other Call of Duty Esports Events
I asked Daniel Tsay:
Call of Duty League ends in June or July, and the next season picks up December or January. There’s that big gulf, that huge off-season there. Is it like, you guys have a desire to start filling that a bit more? Do you think there’s going to be anything more to supplement that to fill that void?
The huge gap between seasons has been an issue in the Call of Duty space for years, because nothing else existed. Challengers, the tier below the Call of Duty League, runs quiet, and the Esports World Cup wraps up its Call of Duty portion in just two or three days.
To answer my question about supplementary events, Daniel Tsay argued that there’s an opportunity for COD esports fans to diversify their portfolio outside of the Call of Duty League:
Our audience bases are kind of cross-pollinating across multiplayer and Warzone. Right now, our multiplayer calendar does span across nine months, including EWC.
And so, you think about a little three-month off-season, it feels about right to go away and then come back wanting more and salivating when the season begins.
But if you want to not have a break, go watch all these other Call of Duty esports that we have in Warzone. It’s a nice synergistic relationship there.
This year, Call of Duty kicked off the Warzone Resurgence Series, which also saw airtime during the DreamHack Birmingham Major. That’ll continue through the Esports World Cup, as will the multiplayer portion of the ecosystem.
Do you think Call of Duty esports needs more entertainment during the off-season? Or should it be up to the organizations to provide that content? Let us know your thoughts on the Insider Gaming Discord server.
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Grant has been gaming for 30+ years and in the industry for 10+. You'll probably find him playing a post-apocalyptic game or an extraction shooter somewhere.
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