In what could be a turning point in the gaming industry, Activision Blizzard is launching an esports league around Call of Duty. The Call of Duty league has attracted many franchise owners, and they’ve already paid $25 million to be a part of it. In fact, the league will consist of 12 teams and they will start playing in 2020. Millions of people play this game, and the gaming company is putting together this league in order to monetize esports akin to traditional sports leagues.
Here are some of the important features of Call of Duty League
- The 12 franchises will represent international cities
- Players receive a guaranteed payment of $50,000
- Each team will have between seven and 10 players
- They even get retirement and healthcare benefits
- Housing benefits for players are not part of the offering
- Franchisees should share 50% of the prize money with the players
Activision Blizzard and Google join hands
The companies entered a long-term and multi-year strategic relationship to bring new player experiences. In effect, the gaming giant will use Google Cloud to host its gaming infrastructure and YouTube will help stream the games worldwide. However, China is the only country excluded from the list. In addition, live broadcasts of Activision Blizzard’s esports leagues and events will be streamed on YouTube. The list includes Call of Duty League, Hearthstone Esports, Overwatch League, etc.
The company cited many reasons why it chose Google Cloud:
- Google Cloud has a global footprint and is accessible everywhere, except China
- It comes with advanced data analytics which will help Activision Blizzard to analyze gaming trends and insight about players.
- Google Cloud also has artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities, which makes it easier to enhance interaction between interfaces and players
- Google’s technical know-how and Activision Blizzard’s gaming experienced will help bring premium network quality-of-service to players
- Enhanced personalization will make playing games a very enjoyable experience to users
Call of Duty League will benefit from Activision Blizzard’s decision to rope in Google
Certainly, when Activision Blizzard has some mega plans of launching professional esports leagues, it will need the assistance of a company like Google. Call of Duty league may attract millions of users at the same time, and only Google will be able to handle that kind of traffic. Certainly, this venture will bring enhanced experiences to players and improved infrastructure to Activision Blizzard.
