Call of Duty Elite pulls in 7 million users, 1.5 million paid memberships

[Heisenberg]

Call of Duty Elite, the community portal for Activision's perennial shooter is apparently doing gangbusters, according to the publisher's 2011 earnings report. The report states that Elite has pulled in over 7 million members as of January 31. Even more impressive: over 1.5 million of those are premium subscriptions, available as part of the $100 Hardened Edition of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 or as a separate $50 purchase. Paid membership grants a few benefits, most notably a free pass and early access to Modern Warfare 3 DLC. We'd say the service probably qualifies as a success at this point, at least from Activision's perspective.

Haven't got it but have seen it and on friends consoles, some say the dlc release calendar should have been up from day 1 with ALL the content not just dribs and drabs. Also, there is not enough multiplayer maps being released considering the game as well as elite came out in early November and the early maps are the only benefit.

 

[Defiant]

I don't see any benefit to Elite either besides free and early access to map packs. Activision stack the price for their map packs (usually $15 for 3-5 maps), I can't understand the logic of paying $50 for Elite to get them a few days earlier. That's a lot of parents wallets getting hit.