Now that the dust has settled, we can piece together a little more detail about Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare. Infinity Ward’s Taylor Kurosaki and Jacob Minkoff have been busy giving interviews, including the latest with PlayStation’s Sid Shuman:
For those of you without thirty minutes to spare, there are a few main points to take away from the interview. The developers were keen to stress that Infinite Warfare was designed to feel like a Call of Duty game – they both used the word “grounded” a lot, and make a ton of references to military and naval consultants on the project making sure that the futuristic elements of the game feel like a natural progression from today’s armed forces operations. They also cited war stories – including Band of Brothers and Black Hawk Down – as inspirations over science fiction, and anticipated that the game’s epic central conflict would have a feel similar to a World War scenario.
The single player campaign takes place entirely in our own Solar System, and locations will so far include Earth, Titan and at least one asteroid. The developers were keen to stress the central concept of leadership. Protagonist Reyes is no rookie, and will quickly find himself Captain of a warship called the Retribution, deciding when and how to take on missions from STRATCOM whilst also picking up “targets of opportunity” – self-started missions yielding weapons, loot and intel, which in turn boost chances of success in the main campaign missions.
The other main concept Infinity Ward have been wanting to get across is the supposed seamlessness of the experience. When playing the game, we should find no loading screens between a ground battle, getting in our airship (a “Jackal”, capable of below- and above-stratosphere flight), zooming into space and into the Retribution. Similarly, during a space dogfight, there should be situations where you can seamlessly exit your Jackal and get into zero-G combat. Space combat was touched on briefly, mainly to mention that the core cover-based gameplay of Call of Duty will be retained in these sequences through the use of a grapple and thrusters, to effectively sprint between points of cover.
It was also made clear that the single player campaign of Infinite Warfare will not include co-op. The inevitable Co-op Zombie mode was hinted at but no further details were given.
In other news, the Legacy Pro edition of Infinite Warfare will be exclusive to GAME in the UK - which means if any of us Brits want to get our hands on the Steelbook and soundtrack (as well as unannounced digital extras) we will have to head to their stores or website. If you do pre-order from GAME, you’ll get 500 COD points (redeemable in Call of Duty: Black Ops III) and – while stocks last – a limited edition double-sided poster.
What about that Modern Warfare remaster? Well, apart from the obvious audio-visual upgrades, all we know is that the full campaign will be included but apparently only 10 multiplayer maps will appear, at least at launch. Known maps are “Crash”, “Backlot” and “Crossfire”. The multiplayer will be updated to include “killstreaks, XP, Prestige and more”.
How are we all feeling about Infinite Warfare so far? I think it’s a missed opportunity to really jump the shark, call it Infinity War and introduce superheroes as well as space marines. Maybe next year?
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