A job advert reveals what many have long suspected. The next Call Of Duty game will be made by new studio, Sledgehammer…
After the very public dispute between Infinity Ward and publisher Activision last year, which led to the departure of studio founders Vince Zampella and Grant Collier (not to mention 22 loyal members of staff), many predicted that the next Call Of Duty installment would be handled by an entirely different developer.
As any shooter fanatic will already know, it’s become something of a tradition for the COD franchise to be divided between two studios, Infinity Ward and Treyarch, with each taking turns to release a new installment every year. And with Treyarch’s Black Ops currently raking in tons of cash, talk has already begun regarding the next game.
Industry crystal ball gazer Michael Pachter predicted last month that, given Activision’s dispute with Infinity Ward, the next COD game would be put together by Sledgehammer Games, the new studio set up by former Visceral heads Glen Schofield and Michael Condrey.
"Activision was intentionally opaque about who was working on next year's game, and specifically refused to acknowledge whether the next game was being made by Infinity Ward or Sledgehammer when I asked them directly about it,” Pachter told Eurogamer.
The confirmation that Sledgehammer is indeed making the next COD game comes from Gamasutra, where the studio placed a job post for “the next Call Of Duty game”.
While details about the game are understandably thin on the ground at this stage, it’s not unreasonable to suggest that the next COD game will be none other than Modern Warfare 3. On his Twitter feed, Glen Schofield suggested that the studio was consulting members of the military for inspiration. "Working w/ military guys - their stories will blow you away. Names/locations will change but some situations going in the game - real stuff,” Schofield wrote. Could this be a sign that the game will be set in the present day, as opposed to the historical skirmishes seen in games such as Black Ops and World At War? Or will the next COD game really be set in space, as rumours late last year suggested?
Since every Call Of Duty game since the dawn of time has arrived just in time for Christmas, you can be sure that the Activision marketing machine to click into gear over the next few months.
Eurogamer