The outbreak of coronavirus (COVID-19) is impacting countless events worldwide, as organizations rightly take health and safety concerns into their planning considerations. One of the latest to be impacted is the Call of Duty League, which is moving to online-only events for the foreseeable future.
The news comes from a statement from Activision, explaining the decision and what fans and participants could look forward to in the future.
The statement reads:
We are continuing to closely monitor COVID-19 (coronavirus), city-level recommendations and mandates, and all guidelines set forth by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
After careful review and working in close collaboration with our teams, we are shifting all currently scheduled 2020 Call of Duty League live events to online-only competition, effective immediately…
…The new online-only matches will be broadcast live to fans. Dates will be announced shortly, along with tune-in details.
However, this won’t be the norm moving forward. Activision also said it recognizes the value and importance of live events and will resume hosting them as soon as it’s safe to do so.
What you should expect to be the norm, though, is more cancellations like this until the virus situation comes under control, as we’re seeing current and future events either rescheduled or cancelled outright thanks to the virus.
The full announcement can be found on the Call of Duty League‘s website. Stay tuned to GameSkinny as we follow coronavirus’ impact on the games industry.
If you’re just catching up, here’s some of the coronavirus’ effects on gaming so far:
- Nintendo Switch could see delays from coronavirus
- Could the PlayStation 5 release date get pushed back?
- GDC 2020 gets cancelled, IGDA provides relief
- E3 2020 won’t happen, but will this be the end of the show?
- Two game developers might hold streaming events in lieu of E3
- Minecraft festival gets postponed because of coronavirus
