Activision's chief marketing officer, Tyler Bahl, says Call of Duty now pays what he calls a "Call of Duty tax" — a built-in penalty in how the press and critics cover the franchise simply because it releases every year. Bahl made the comments in an interview with The Game Business, published this week, days ahead of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4's October 23 launch on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch 2 and PC.
"I think we get the coverage, but we call it the 'Call of Duty tax,'" Bahl said, discussing how the series is reviewed and received compared to other big releases. He argued that because Call of Duty has shipped a new premium entry annually for close to two decades, outlets and players alike have started treating it the way they would an annual sports title like Madden or NBA 2K, rather than as a major event.
The Argument, In Bahl's Words
Bahl's case is that scale works against Call of Duty rather than for it. He pointed to the franchise's size — more than 500 million units sold across the series and over 100 million free-to-play players — as evidence that the audience has simply become "status quo" to much of the games press, making new entries easier to overlook or dismiss sight-unseen.
He also pushed back on the idea that Call of Duty gets a free pass because of its popularity, saying the opposite dynamic is closer to the truth: familiarity breeds lower expectations and less scrutiny of the work that goes into each release, according to Bahl.
The Numbers Behind the Complaint
Bahl's framing lines up with a real shift in how the series scores. Call of Duty entries once routinely landed in the high 70s to low 80s on Metacritic; in recent years, mainline releases have more often settled into the mid-60s. Whether that drop reflects declining quality, reviewer fatigue, or the "tax" Bahl describes is a matter of interpretation — Activision's framing is clearly the latter, and it's worth treating as the company's own read on its press coverage rather than an independently verified trend.
Why Now
The comments arrive as part of a broader marketing push around Modern Warfare 4, which Activision has also pitched as one of the two biggest releases of the year alongside GTA 6. Rather than leaning purely on a splashy reveal trailer, Activision has said it wants this year's campaign to spotlight the development teams behind the game and the work involved in making it, a response, in part, to the coverage gap Bahl is describing.
Why It Matters
Framing criticism as a structural "tax" rather than addressing score trends directly is a notable rhetorical move from one of the industry's biggest publishers, and it comes right before reviews for Modern Warfare 4 start landing. Readers should treat this as Activision's marketing narrative heading into launch — a company explaining away scrutiny — rather than a neutral account of how the franchise is actually reviewed. The real test will be how Modern Warfare 4 scores and sells once it's out on October 23.
Emma covers gaming news and industry announcements for Gamingonix, reporting on releases, reveals and the stories moving fast.
