CoD is consistently the highest selling game on Playstation, so there's a big motivation right there- put it in Gamepass, and get people to buy an XBox and Gamepass instead of a PS5
Overwatch 2, Diablo 4 are coming soon, and will presumably be big.
CoD: Warzone is doing gangbusters.
Mobile games (Diablo for phones, all of King's games, CoD for phones), which is a big blind spot for Microsoft right now.
Big back catalogue of interesting IP like Crash, Spyro, Tony Hawks, etc. Now Microsoft can use that back catalogue to fill out Gamepass library, as well as developing mid-budget new games in the series to act as Gamepass filler between big releases.
Yeah true.
I admit I didn't exactly think much about Call of Duty in there. It stems from my complete disinterest in that franchise since... very long. The last CoD game I played was CoD 3 on the original Wii, and that was at a friend's place; just tried it out for about 1 or 2 hours (only thing I recall out of it was a sequence where my character gets in a fight against a Nazi and I had to use the motion controls to 'fight' and shake him off of me). Before that, I played and finished both original CoD games (PC versions) but that was it after that really. However, it's probably the main acquisition in this big purchase.
I don't think we have any information to say that Overwatch 2 and/or Diablo 4 are 'coming soon' though. But they should be generating good money for Microsoft whenever they do come out (especially Overwatch 2, not quite sure about Diablo 4 yet).
I do maintain, however, that a number of Blizzard... erm, I mean Acti- ... actually I mean Microsoft (now) franchises will need some form of repair. I'm actually playing Heroes of the Storm regularly, but that game being kept online because they never shut down the servers is the only reason why it persists, because it was abandoned almost completely the very day they decided to shut down the eSports scene for it. It's one particular 'still active, but nearly dead' game in their catalogue now that they should look at more (by "look at" I mean give that game an actual development team and rejuvenate it to bring it back on the stage and to the eyes of the gamers population).
Same with Overwatch right now, it's in survival mode, no significant updates for I think over a year by now, nearly two. Heck they even stopped doing those amazing CGI short stories since about 3 years (or more I think). All that matters for it right now is the yearly competitive stuff going for it, and Seasons-based events to unlock new character skins and other non-essentials and cosmetics.
They'll get their money back and then some, sure. But I think it'll be done mostly via 'other' franchises (franchises not known to have been made initially by the original Blizzard before Activision showed up in the family portrait). The only 'Blizzard IP' I can see being popular in the coming year (maybe, if it does come out within that time frame) is Overwatch 2, at least initially. For StarCraft I don't know what they can do with that, lest making StarCraft 3. For Heroes of the Storm they just need to provide it a team. For D4... well it's already in development so 'let it be' is the best thing to do for now and just hope it turns out well (it should but... I have some doubts on that one).