Activision Blizzard (ATVI) Releases Destiny: Rise Of Iron

Video game publishing giant, Activision Blizzard, Inc. (NASDAQ:ATVI) has released one of the most anticipated titles of the year, Destiny: Rise of Iron for PS4 and Xbox One. Prized at $29.99, Rise of Iron has seen blockbuster response in terms of pre-orders and Activision has called it the “most anticipated expansion for Destiny ever.”

Rise of Iron will take players to look at the backdrop of “The Iron Banner” event and join forces with Lord Saladin to fight and defeat a ferocious enemy from the past and become Iron Lords. Players will also get new weapons, gears, as well as quests along with Supremacy, a new competitive multiplayer mode. Initial reviews for the game are decent with GamesRadar calling it "a great expansion but straining within the game’s current framework".

Also, Destiny fans will be treated with Destiny – The Collection. Prized at $59.99, The Collection, as the name suggests, is a compilation of all releases of the shooter franchise so far. The combination of Rise of Iron and The Collection has made the release so important.

Destiny has been developed by Bungie of Halo fame and published by Activision. First released on Sep 9, 2014, it is first person shooter game set in a mythical-cum-science fiction world. It is the first title to be released under Activision-Bungie’s 10-year deal. In fact, Destiny holds the record for the being the biggest new franchise launch. Destiny earned over $500 million in just a day of its release. The franchise has an aggregate score of 75/100 on Metacritic while Game Informer has given it 8.75 out of 10.

Apart from Destiny, Activision will be releasing Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare on Nov 4, 2016. It is one of the most highly anticipated titles of the year. Call of Duty is one of the most important revenue generators for the company. Last year, Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 earned over $550 million, globally, in its opening weekend. The phenomenal success was driven by a 100% rise in digital downloads. Last month, the company held a Call of Duty XP event in California to showcase its upcoming titles. The response to the event boosted investors’ sentiments and at the same time raised expectations for the upcoming titles. The event highlighted that Activision is well positioned to gain from the upcoming holiday season.

The holiday season is the most important time of the year for video game stocks. Most of the companies generate maximum sales during this time of the year. They go by the idea of ‘saving the best for the last’ and release their most important titles during the holiday season.

Some other important releases scheduled for the holiday season include Take Two Interactive’s (NASDAQ:TTWO) Mafia III, Electronic Arts’ (NASDAQ:EA) Battlefield 1 and Titanfall 2, Bethesda’s Skyrim Special edition and Ubisoft’s Watch Dogs 2 among others.

At present Activision carries a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). Another stock worth considering in the tech sector is Facebook Inc. (NASDAQ:FB) , which sports a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Ranks stocks here.

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