10 TERRIBLE Video Games (That Secretly Saved Franchises)
5. Call Of Duty: Infinite Warfare
By the time Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare hit stores in 2016, it was undeniable that the enormously popular FPS franchise was going through both franchise fatigue and something of an identity crisis.
The two previous games, Advanced Warfare and Black Ops III, were divisively received by fans who felt that their more futuristic focus drifted too far away from the series' roots as a military shooter, and Infinite Warfare represented an insane apex of those complaints.
Despite its impressive visuals, Infinite Warfare's campaign committed the cardinal sin of being both ridiculous and dull, while the multiplayer was pilloried for its excessively twitchy pace and loot box mechanics, and Activision was harshly criticised for only making Modern Warfare Remastered available to those who purchased special editions of the game.
Underwhelming sales caused Activision to state that Infinite Warfare "didn't resonate with fans," and ultimately led to a far healthier diversification of the franchise across its development teams.
The very next game, Call of Duty: WWII, was a back-to-basics boots-on-the-ground affair, while Black Ops 4 was focused around its Battle Royale mode Blackout (admittedly at the expense of a campaign), and last year's Modern Warfare reboot offered up 64-player mayhem for the first time in the series.
Though not all new Call of Duty games will be for all players, it's simply refreshing that each new game has its own identity rather than simply being another also-ran futuristic shooter that's virtually indistinguishable from the previous one.