These Games Drove Audience Reach for Activision Blizzard

The next two articles in this series look at the key games and franchises that affected Activision Blizzard’s audience reach, player engagement, and player investment. In the first quarter, Activision Blizzard (ATVI) had monthly active users (or MAU’s) of 374 million. This figure stood at 385 million in the previous quarter.

King Digital’s MAUs were 285 million in the first quarter, and its engagement remained strong with daily time spent per user hitting record levels. Activision’s MAUs were 51 million as the Call of Duty franchise grew its audience base year-over-year. Blizzard’s MAUs stood at 38 million, and according to Activision Blizzard’s press release, “World of Warcraft over‐performed versus the prior expansion at this point in time, with higher engagement sequentially and strong community participation with in‐game purchases.”

Activision Blizzard is banking on Hearthstone, which continues to engage global audiences through experiences such as promotional bundles, a player-versus-environment mode, an expansion, and Monster Hunts. Overwatch also added new players with strong user engagement metrics.

Over the last few months, Activision has aimed to stabilize its user base for its King segment by releasing new features and content into live games to attract new players and increase user engagement.