Black Ops 4 Blackout is rumoured to become free-to-play in 2019.
The first ever Call of Duty battle royale mode is currently only playable to those that purchase Black Ops 4 on PS4, Xbox One and PCs.
But that’s rumoured to change in 2019 with one analyst predicting that Activision will make Blackout a free-to-play mode.
Blackout will allegedly become free-to-play in the second half of 2019 as a way to promote Call of Duty 2019.
That’s the view of industry analyst Michael Pachter, who previously correctly predicted that a Call of Duty Battle Royale mode would launch in 2018.
In an interview with GIBiz Pachter also predicted that Overwatch would be made free-to-play by Activision.
In a post online he said: “I think that the 18 Overwatch League owners have been assured by Blizzard that it will expand the audience for Overwatch.
“The most expedient way to do this is to make the core game free-to-play in order to attract tens of millions of new users, who ostensibly will convert to OWL viewers.
“I expect this by mid-June (the third anniversary of the launch of the original game.
“Disgruntled players who bought the core game will likely be compensated by being given free stuff (skins or other cosmetic items).
“Blackout will go FTP at least a month prior to the launch of next year’s Call of Duty, in order to promote the new game.”
The GIBiz article shows the correct predictions Pachter made to them last year.
Among those was Switch selling under 20million, no big Rockstar Games announcements and no new hardware from any of the big three gaming giants.
However, his prediction that the Xbox One X would be cut to $349 by the year end fell short of the mark.
Pachter is expecting Blackout to become free-to-play “at least a month” before the launch of Call of Duty 2019.
Looking at past Call of Duty releases, Black Ops 4 was out in October last year and COD WW2 released in November 2017.
So, if Pachter is right it would mean Blackout could become free to play from September 2019 onwards.
If Blackout and Overwatch does become free-to-play it will be interesting to see the impact it has on the player base of Fortnite.
Epic Games has seen Fortnite go from strength-to-strength, becoming the all-conquering online shooter it is now ever since the free Battle Royale mode was launched in 2017.
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