Activision Blizzard is one of gaming’s biggest companies. Although the publisher has seen its fair share of controversy in recent years, it still has an incredibly strong following through massive franchises like Call of Duty, Warcraft, Overwatch and Diablo. With a number of projects in the pipeline, most notably Overwatch 2 and Diablo 4, a recent survey asked about people’s interest in a number of elements that could possibly feature in Activision Blizzard’s future games. Included among these elements, where play-to-earn games and NFTs. Of course, the subject is still quite a divisive topic among gamers, and it’s certainly an interesting question for the publisher to ask. But what exactly are Activision Blizzard’s intents so far? Will we be seeing a push for blockchain gaming from the publisher? And what does this mean for Activision Blizzard’s planned releases? Read on below to find out.

A New Frontier for Activision Blizzard?

Activision Blizzard have gone through quite the rollercoaster ride in the last few months. The company was brought to its knees following a series of claims regarding sexual assault and misconduct by high-ranking members within the organization. The publisher faced the wrath of public backlash, with shares dropping and fans boycotting games. Back in January of 2022, Microsoft announced its intent of buying out the publisher for $68.7 billion, promising to regenerate the company’s image and status. With all these changes happening so swiftly, it would b no surprise to see the company shift its focus in a new direction as well. Back in 2002, it became the leader of first-person shooters with Call of Duty and in 2004, it won over the MMORPG war with the inimitable World of Warcraft. So, who is to say that the next big foray for Activision Blizzard couldn’t be NFT gaming? In a recent YouGov survey, Activision Blizzard players were asked, “How interested are you in the following emerging/future trends in gaming?”. The list included Cross-play options, AI gaming content generation, VR gaming, as well as play-to-earn games and NFTs.

Not Likely to Happen Anytime Soon

The survey itself is a very broad scenario, one which points to the company expressing the slightest interest in NFTs within games. It doesn’t mean that Activision Blizzard will be implementing blockchain technology into their games anytime soon. In fact, newly appointed president Mike Ybarra tweeted to say that “no one is doing NFTs”. The tweet tells us that titles like Diablo 4 and Overwatch 2 remain NFT free. But who is to say that this won’t change in the near future?

Just An Expression of Interest for now, the survey has to be taken as a simple expression of interest from Blizzard Activision. Publishers have been quite skeptical so far about implementing blockchain technology and will probably wait to see how current games fair before making the leap. Still, its interesting to see that publishers are considering the likelihood of NFT gaming becoming a part of the AAA gaming world.