Call of Duty series enters three-year dev cycle

Call of Duty games are about to get even more lavish as its upcoming titles will get 50 per cent more time in development. That's right, the franchise is migrating to a three-year dev cycle with series stalwarts Infinity Ward and Treyarch being joined by Sledgehammer Games as the trio of devs who will take turns releasing CoD games.

Sledgehammer will premier its Call of Duty game in 2014.

The announcement was made during Activision's conference call today. "This will give our designers more time to envision and innovate for each title. Simultaneously, it will give our content creators more focus on DLC and micro-DLC which, as you know, have become large and high-margin opportunities and significant engagement drivers," said Activision Publishing CEO Eric Hirshberg. "Finally, it will give our teams more time to polish, helping ensure we deliver the best possible experience to our fans each and every time."

Sledgehammer is a relatively new studio that collaborated with Infinity Ward on the massively successful Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, and its founders previously played a key role in developing Dead Space at Visceral Games.

"They've demonstrated their skill on Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 and on their past highly-rated games," said Hirschberg during the call.

We have yet to find out what Sledgehammer's first solo outing as a CoD developer will be.