Competing mega publisher EA wants none of it though, with EA CEO John Riccitiello recently telling Kotaku that they would "make a better game" and then "make a better game again".

 

It may not sound like the most complicated business strategy, but EA is staying confident that its own healthy arsenal of shooter titles can dethrone the mighty Call of Duty. "If I had to pick the story I'd like to play out next year is we ship a 90 and they ship an 85," Riccitiello said, referring to Metacritic scores for the titles.

 

Interestingly, Activision's latest blockbuster Call of Duty: Black Ops sports a Metacritic average of 88, while EA's Battlefield Bad Company 2 also brags with an overall score of 88 (with more favourable user scores), signalling that the Battlefield series at least is gobbling up some of COD's market share.

 

The company's modern reboot of its successful WW2 Medal of Honor series did not fair as well though, with the game receiving mixed reviews. "We knew we were building on Unreal [graphics engine] for Medal of Honor which wasn't our foot-forward tact," he said.

 

"We knew that going in. Our next game [Battlefield 3] is being built on the second generation of Frostbite which I think is at least in my opinion is a class act for FPS. I think we're going to lift the game pretty dramatically in the first person shooter category."

 

Most of EA's hopes for FPS glory seems to be resting on Battlefield 3 at the moment, but the studio has a strong line-up for 2011 regardless. A few EA games to watch out for next year includes Bulletstorm (from the creators of Gears of War), Crysis 2 and an unannounced title presumably in the pipeline from Respawn Entertainment, the studio made up of former Infinity Ward members after their less than perfect split from the Activision empire.

 

EA's stable is looking very healthy at this stage and if the guys over at DICE can sprinkle on the perfect amount of awesome sauce, 2011's Battlefield 3 may very well herald the resurgence of EA as masters of the FPS domain.