ood games are made in more than 1 year, like prototype 2 that comes only in 2012
while I do agree that more time does GENERALLY equal better product, there's a peak and a sharp descent sometimes my friend. Starcraft II is an example of a game that took 10 years to come out, not necessarily meaning there were 10 years of dev. time, but I digress.
Duke Nukem: Forever and Too Human are two excellent examples of when too much dev. time brings about doom for a game.
And from there, Left 4 Dead 2 took a year to make, probably less, and it was one of the most critically acclaimed games of 2009. So there are variations. (and yet ANOTHER example of ANOTHER scenario is Borderlands, started dev. in 2004, released in 2009, one of the best shooters of this console generation)
I do agree that CoD needs to take a break from bi-yearly releases between the two developers. Sure, its a clever tactic Activision uses, one year it was made by one of the most legendary FPS studios of all time, the other year... well, the name of that developer was turned into a derogatory term for a bad game...
Halo games had 3 years (2001, 2004, 2007, 2010), Gears had a 2006, 2008, 2011 schedule, and God of War had the same release schedule as Halo, save the 2001 release.
Back to Call of Duty, I like the series, I really do. I have a rich history with the original two Call of Duty's and the original Modern Warfare coupled nicely with Halo 3 back when they were two of my first couple of games on the Xbox 360 (neither held a candle to Viva Pinata though). But the yearly releases have been making me grind my teeth for quite some time now.
The lack of innovation and change between the games absolutely DECIMATES the industry. I mean, if it wasn't for Crysis 2, the FPS genre would still be in standstill from Homefront's CoD-clone nuclear -warhead effects.
As the best selling and one of the most-recognizable franchises out there, Raven, Sledgehammer, Treyarch, and the remnants of Infinity Ward have a responsibility to set examples for other developers to follow to create a better video game industry, just as Bethesda, Rockstar, EPIC, DICE, and Bungie have for the past decade or so.
-Chillz
