Exclusive: Activision had a working DMZ build before Warzone devs even started on Verdansk ActivisionIn our recent sit down with Infinity Ward, two lead multiplayer developers on the Call of Duty franchise confirmed longstanding rumors that they indeed had a working DMZ prototype before work even began on what would become Warzone\u2019s original map in Verdansk. When Warzone burst onto the scene in early 2020, it took the battle royale genre by storm. Dropping 150 players into one giant map and having them fight with Call of Duty\u2019s pristine FPS fundamentals proved to be a recipe for success. More than 100 million fans jumped into the game during its initial boom period, helping Activision generate billions in revenue. However, it turns out the wildly popular BR formula wasn\u2019t actually first in line to break the traditional multiplayer mold for the CoD series. Rather, a more tactical game mode was surprisingly built first, though one that didn\u2019t see the light of day until 2022. Confirming earlier rumors that Warzone 2\u2019s new DMZ mode had been in the works for quite some time, devs revealed to us at Dexerto they indeed had \u201cworking prototypes\u201d before work even began on Warzone\u2019s original Verdansk map. Originally, seemingly as early as 2018, Infinity Ward \u201cfelt ripples\u201d and \u201csaw trends\u201d in the FPS market they wanted CoD to capitalize on. One such example was the rising popularity of more tactically-focused, survival-based games such as Escape From Tarkov. Thus, the idea for the \u2018Demilitarized Zone\u2019 (DMZ) came into focus. The concept as it was five years ago, largely remained intact for what we now have in Warzone 2 today. Dozens of players dropped into a vast, open battlefield, engaging with AI, securing loot, and extracting valuable goods before doing it all over again on repeat. Devs were actively playtesting CoD\u2019s take on this style of FPS before work began on the first Battle Royale iteration. \u201cWe actually had working prototypes before we started making Verdansk,\u201d Multiplayer Design Director Geoff Smith told us. \u201cWe felt that was a direction we needed to go. We felt those trends that early, but we didn\u2019t have the bandwidth to execute on it at the time.\u201d In a different timeline, it seems there\u2019s a very solid likelihood DMZ could have reached the market long before Warzone. Devs had the foresight to begin planning many years ago, though ultimately pivoted to focus on what would become a massively successful BR instead. \u201cIn general, good game development is to try crazy, scary stuff,\u201d Smith joked after revealing DMZ\u2019s early origins. Part of the gig is to keep tabs on the industry as a whole, check in on the competition, and see how new ideas can come to life under the CoD umbrella, he explained. \u201cJust trying different things, sometimes they\u2019re first person, sometimes they\u2019re third person, sometimes they\u2019re one life, sometimes they\u2019re respawn, sometimes they\u2019re console or PC,\u201d Infinity Ward\u2019s Joseph Cecot continued. \u201cAlways playing and looking at what\u2019s there. It\u2019s just like anyone who writes books, they read a lot of books. Anyone who makes TV, they watch a lot of TV. So you kind of want to know what you\u2019re getting yourself into and how you can stand out.\u201d Given how early DMZ was clearly being experimented with, there\u2019s really no telling what the CoD devs may already be planning for the next few years. Evidently beyond just annual releases themselves, but even more expansive, franchise-defining modes could very well be in their prototype stages today.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Exclusive: Activision had a working DMZ build before Warzone devs even started on Verdansk ActivisionIn our recent sit down with Infinity Ward, two lead multiplayer developers on the Call of Duty franchise confirmed longstanding rumors that they indeed had a working DMZ prototype before work even began on what would become Warzone\u2019s original map in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-26207","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26207","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26207"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26207\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26207"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26207"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26207"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}