Activision's Costly Call of Duty Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Crossover Has Some Players Saying Black Ops 6 Should Just Go Free-to-Play at This Point
Call of Duty’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles crossover looks set to cost up to $90’s worth of COD Points in order to obtain all the items — and the community is now saying Activision should just make Black Ops 6 free-to-play at this point.
Activision unveiled the Black Ops 6 Season 02 Reloaded content coming to the shooter on February 20, and detailed the mid-season Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles crossover in the process.
Each of the four turtles (Leonardo, Donatello, Michelangelo, and Raphael) has their own premium bundle. Based on previous collaborations, these bundles are expected to cost 2,400 COD Points, or $19.99, each. So, if you want all four turtles you face the prospect of handing over $80’s worth of COD Points.
But that’s not all. As it did with the controversial Squid Game crossover, Activision has created a premium event pass for the Turtles crossover, which costs 1,100 COD Points / $10. This includes a number of eye-catching cosmetics, chief among them Splinter. Again, there is no other way of getting Splinter than paying the $10 for the premium track of the event pass. The free track includes two Foot Clan soldier skins, among other cosmetics.
As many have pointed out, the Turtles crossover is heavy on the cosmetics but does not feature gameplay affecting items. No-one has to buy any or all of it to compete in Black Ops 6 multiplayer. And there are many within the community saying it’s easy to ignore Call of Duty crossovers like the Turtles one and leave those willing to spend more to it.
But that hasn’t stopped some players within the community from criticizing Activision once again for the high cost of these cosmetics, and are saying this second ever Call of Duty premium event pass suggests Black Ops 6 is now being monetized as if it were a free-to-play game like Fortnite.
“Activision casually glossing over the fact that they want you to pay $80+ if you want the 4 Turtles, plus another $10+ if you want the TMNT event pass rewards,” redditor II_JangoFett_II said. “Call of Duty’s Gross greed strikes again… DESPICABLE!”
“Guess we can expect an event pass sold every season now,” Hipapitapotamus suggested. “Remember when events were good and got you cool universal camos for free.”
“The Turtles don’t use guns,” APensiveMonkey declared. “Their fingers wouldn’t even… I hate this…”
It’s worth going into more detail on how Activision monetizes Black Ops 6. Each season brings with it a new battle pass, the base version of which costs 1,100 COD Points / $9.99. There’s an extra premium version of the battle pass, called BlackCell, which costs $29.99 (you can’t buy this one with COD Points). Then there is a constant stream of cosmetics available to buy from the store. The Turtles crossover, with its premium event pass, is on top of all this.
“So they expect the playerbase to buy the game itself, buy the battle pass/black cell and now this? Na that’s too much,” PunisherR35 added. “If this is gonna be the norm moving forward, CoD needs to move to a FTP model (campaign, MP).”
In truth, Activision’s aggressive monetization of Call of Duty is nothing new. It’s just that the new premium event pass, which made its debut with Black Ops 6’s Squid Game crossover, has pushed some fans over the edge. And as has been pointed out many times before, the standardized monetization across the $70 Black Ops 6 and the free-to-play battle royale Warzone does Black Ops 6 no favors. What might be acceptable for Warzone given it’s free-to-play isn’t necessarily acceptable for Black Ops 6, given it costs $70 just to be able to play Multiplayer.
And that’s where the calls for Black Ops 6 Multiplayer to go free-to-play come from. With each new microtransaction Call of Duty Multiplayer feels more and more like Fortnite, Apex Legends, Marvel Rivals, and of course Warzone.
Activision and parent company Microsoft will of course stick to its guns, given Call of Duty’s incredible popularity. Black Ops 6 was the biggest Call of Duty launch ever, and set a new single day Game Pass subscription record. Sales on PlayStation and Steam jumped 60% compared to 2023’s Modern Warfare 3. Clearly, Call of Duty is doing the business for Activision and new owner Microsoft, which the financial officers will no doubt be delighted with given the Xbox maker paid an eye-watering $69 billion for the company.
Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.
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