I'm the total opposite. I have 2 people on PSN that just play COD and I always tell them "you know there are other games other than COD?".
They just shrug it off and keep playing it. Its really no different than people who only play WOW for video games.I think they play a game like COD and they play enough that they are good if not better than most of their friends that play COD, so to them its the game that they can say "I bet I can kick your ass in COD". To play another game and get good at it too is a pointless endeavor.
What to me is annoying is when you get a message from said friend and they write "Hey! 40 tomahawk kills" "I'm awesome!" "Check out my youtube channel!" WTF?! Seriously I don't care or give a fuck about your tomahawk kills.

Well, point of a console is entertainment, and if a few games are enough to keep them entertained, then more power to them. I know of people that still play CounterStrike 1.6. They'll try other games, but revert back to CS afterwards... even though they have a supercomputer. =/
I don't see why that would be annoying, people can do whatever they want. I'd rather it stays that way too, I'm pretty sure you don't want casual CoD players running around in Killzone and ruining things for you (and I don't want a bossy CS player playing BC2 and telling me to rush Bravo)

As for CoD's popularity, it's a snowball effect. It got initial fame, and many people got introduced to gaming with it. It also is advertised and there's a lot of people that own consoles but don't necessarily follow gaming but see the ads and pick it up. Friends might also recommend the game to someone new to gaming. The general train of thought is that the most popular games must be the best, so CoD just gets more and more popular.... or well, it does on consoles. It's popularity is on a decline on PC (but it still is popular, MW still has a ridiculous number of players)

Why do people stick with it? Because it is fun and has the advantage of running at 60fps instead of 30fps like most games (in the longterm, a more fluid game always has the upper hand over a prettier one). Other then that, there's many other reasons for it that you can simply ask your CoD-loving friends.

I know a few people that play other games on the PS3. Other people insist that there is 'nothing' to play on the PS3. I would like a definition of that. Even when the PS3 had games like UC, MS and R1, R & C etc people including the media still claimed that the PS3 has no games. Do they mean games they can play properly? Or games that have MP? Games that are easy to play? Games that are triple A? I don't get it either. I think some people are still stuck in 2006 when everyone was putting down the PS3 for having fewer games then the 360 and mostly using it for a Bluray player.

@ FatOldMan I don't believe it's that at all. Games like that are just so simple minded they attact simple minded people. That is why people flock to them. Anything more complicated makes your head hurt. Fun sometimes doesn't even factor in.You feel like a big man because you think you are so skilled but you can't even go outside of the genre without looking like a loser.

Even I face that sort of situation. One of my friends, who recently bought a PS3, told me to buy Black Ops (because I traded it in for LBP2). There are couple other friends that don't even touch anything else. COD gamers think they are cool and shit, but actually they are not even true gamers. True gamers are people that appreciate games pushing the bars and appreciate having the availability of wide variety of games. I hate to say it, but COD is defining this generation, and thats why consumers are not making the right choices of products. They would get any console, just to play COD.

Because they want to...

Simple as

I find that people who compare gamers by what they play lack in the skills to play that particular game so it is easy to bash them. I have played FPS since the beginning (Wolfenstein 3D, DOOM etc) and one of the best GoldenEye007. I collect FPS and will buy all in a series no matter what development team created them. I play the COD series a lot because there are a lot of things to do on it, I play it mostly on my PS3 but do a bit on my xbox as well as I have a team for CTF. I play 007 on the Wii as much as I do other FPS on my other consoles.
When I want to play an RPG I play it on my PC.

started the popularity with my friends. Im an electrician and we talked about cod4 during lunch breaks and it gor people interested. Id say about 20 of my friends bought an xbox to play cod4 and have bought every cod sinse. Me personally im bored with cod ive traded black ops in and im waiting for killzone 3 to arrive. Im loving the beta

There will always be a larger casual market than the core market. Up until this generation, gaming wasn't even mainstream. CoD is extremely accessible and gameplay simplistic, consisting of just running around and shoot people. Of course, that simplicity appeals to the casual market very greatly, so they buy it. Then their friends buy it. It's a nasty, endless chain of reaction. Casuals don't really care much about graphics or how glitchy the game is or not, they just want something that's easy and fun to them.

My friend bought ps3 just to play MGS4 and Final Fantasy...
Haven't played for a long long time.
It doesn't make sense either..

Then there's people who just want to buy a console, buy 1-3 games when they buy the console and never buy any other games....

Well ps3 exclusives are nice. But they tend to never last. The stories are always good, but ps3 exclusives lack in multiplayer.

I agree with you completely. Call of Duty is making conversation with diverse gamers difficult. If I ever came across another gamer, I wouldn't doubt Call of Duty would come out that person's mouth. People on my friend list play CoD too much also, but I have quite a few JRPG players on my list so it balances out. But, if your looking for someone who does not play CoD, you can add me at ts-shio, I will never buy.own a CoD game. (I do have trophies for WaW because I got really bored and borrowed it from my brother).

Because they want to play CoD but not pay for Xbox Live.
That would be my logic, at least.
I don't know, though. I stopped playing after W@W.

Is there any statistical data to back up this opinion piece?

A lot of my PSN friends dont even play COD... :)

I got the same gripe. My best mate bought a PS3 and all he plays is COD.

Owning 2 PS3's myself I Barely touch my PS3 these days, I think it lost its novelty so I turned back to my old friend.. the 360... Like they say "old friends always party better together"

Till Uncharted 3 and The Guardian releases that is :D

Here's the weirdness.

I know a guy who owns a Wii, a PS3 (with ps+), a 360 (with XBL Gold) and all he plays is Black Ops on his 360 and Runescape on his mom's PC.

Tell me again how the multiplatform strategy was supposed to fix everything. Look at your results and compare them to Nintendo, which keeps thriving with exclusives. Your loyal fans are gone. And let’s not forget the pile of IPs you purchased only to let them rot.

The worst thing is this is down from last years numbers/expectations which was down from the previous years numbers/expectations. You think about how long “down” has been a consistent part of the communication and you realize those subscriptions are what’s holding that boat together. The price cut of gamespass is still a price raise in a string of price raises. They are trying to use players to offset the missing revenue. Now call of duty is out of gamespass, which is literally WHY they bought the company. To draw people to the subscription. They realized they missed a boatload of money and that wasn’t sustainable. Now you pay for it like you would have if they never bought the company… so why buy the company? Mind you those billions still need to be paid back. Yeah it gives you a chance to say we make the biggest FPS… but the internal conversations must be brutal at high level on topics that really matter. Like revenue. Profitability. And ROI for the shopping spree.

Is this like the 10th quarter in a row they're down 33% on hardware how is that even mathematically possible. You would think their mediocrity would Plateau