We've pasted up comments in the past from Activision's outspoken CEO, Bobby Kotick, regarding his ideas to potentially put in place a subscription pay model for Call of Duty's multiplayer, but in recent months that idea has been played down, ending today with definitive comments from Acti's newly appointed CEO of publishing, Eric Hirshberg.

"Are we going to be charging for multiplayer? The answer is no," he told IndustryGamers. "The experience you have out of the box, connecting with the online community to play Call of Duty is absolutely integral to the experience and we'll never charge for that. It's not going to be something we'll attempt to monetize; it's part of the package.

"Nothing we or anyone else tries is going to work if it doesn't have tremendous value for people and add a tremendous value to the gaming experience," he added, while responding to industry analyst, Michael Pachter who was sure they [Activision] would take the subscription route. "He's probably looking at meta-trends in the world and in culture about online services and new ways things should be monetized from Netflix to cloud-based computing. So there are certainly a lot of behavioral shifts towards long-standing online relationships... But at the end of the day, all I'm trying to get across is I can unequivocally say we will never, ever charge for the multiplayer."

Sounds like this guy knows what he's on about - keep him in front of the soundbites and Kotick in his office, counting the money and Acti's image could fast change.