Activision quality assurance workers vote to authorise Call of Duty strike

Unionised quality assurance testers at publisher Activision have voted to authorise a strike ahead of the release of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 next week, Rock Paper Shotgun reported. Quality assurance staff check software for bugs and technical glitches before release. The union represents nearly 600 testers who intend to walk out if working conditions do not improve. [1]

The bargaining process has lasted more than two years, according to a statement from Activision Quality Assurance United-CWA functional tester Emily Danko, which was cited by Rock Paper Shotgun and Kotaku. Danko stated that while the union bargaining committee made responsible proposals, meaningful progress with the publisher remained difficult. [1][3]

Call of Duty is a first-person shooter series published by Activision, which first launched in 2003. As FTMQ Gaming reported earlier, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 will conclude the story of the rebooted Modern Warfare series and includes an open-world extraction mode called DMZ set on the Hajin map. [12][14]

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 is scheduled to launch globally on October 23, 2026. The launch follows the previous main entry in the series, Call of Duty: Black Ops 7, which arrived on November 14, 2025. [12]