10 Video Game Cash Cows The Industry Can’t Stop Milking

Whatever you think about Call of Duty, it's hard to argue against the influence the series has had over the last decade. 2007's Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare offered a gripping and cinematic modern military experience, the likes of which simply hadn't been seen before.

It felt like you were playing through a blockbuster action movie, and the game's multiplayer mode with its innovative progression system proved highly popular and was copied by countless other shooters, as well as inspiring a veritable flood of modern military FPS games. Nowadays, the franchise tends to be criticised and ignored by many hardcore gamers, but still holds huge appeal, selling millions more copies with every new release.

Since 2005's Call of Duty 2 all the way up to 2018's upcoming Black Ops 4, every single year has had a major Call of Duty release, with development duties shifting back and forth between different studios like Treyarch and Infinity Ward.

It's hard to imagine the Call of Duty release train ever slowing down, and publisher Activision has been criticised for continuously releasing titles that often feel almost identical, with little more than a few maps and modes thrown in to differentiate between them.