The number of people playing Blizzard games has dropped by almost 30 per cent in the last three years.

That's according to MassivelyOP, which reports that there's been a 29 per cent dip in active players since the start of 2018. In Q1 2018, Activision Blizzard reported monthly active users to the tune of 38 million; in the most recent quarter – the three months ending March 2021 – this clocks in at just 27 million.

All in all, Activision Blizzard's total number of monthly active users for the first quarter of 2021 saw a 16 per cent increase since 2018, rising to 435 million.

This will have been driven in part by Call of Duty, whose active playerbase has almost tripled to 150 million off the back of free-to-play battle royale title Warzone and Call of Duty Mobile. Warzone alone attracted 100 million people between its launch in March 2020 and April 2021.

Blizzard still has a huge number of players, but the decline over the last three years is notable. During this period, a number of veteran developers from the company have departed, including Overwatch director Jeff Kaplan.