Activision, though, surprised everyone Thursday by releasing an iOS version of Call of Duty without pomp or circumstance. And, in another surprise, it's being made by a team led by a pair of Rockstar Games veterans.

Call of Duty: Strike Team was built entirely with the mobile audience in mind, complete with a vague, futuristic plot (in 2020, the U.S. finds itself at war with an "unknown enemy.") Playable in either a first- or third-person perspective, gamers will control squads of up to five characters. Though currently an iTunes exclusive, the £4.99 game is expected to hit Android devices later this fall.

Strike Team is the first game from The Blast Furnace, Activision's mobile development studio headed by Mark Washbrook, from Rockstar London, and Rockstar Leeds' Gordon Hall.

While the multiplayer component that has made the console game so successful is missing, the single-player is classic, cinematic CoD. There's also a leaderboard-based Survival Mode, pitting you against endless waves of increasingly difficult enemies.

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