The game ‘Call of Duty: Vanguard' is returning to World War II. Here's a rundown of what's new

 

The next mainline entry in the wildly popular Call of Duty franchise, "Call of Duty Vanguard," will include a brand-new squad-based multiplayer mode, a campaign that will include major battles across the four major theaters of World War II, and environments that will react and change in response to bullets and explosions. It'll be released on November 5th, and it'll be Activision Blizzard's first major product since the state of California filed a sexual harassment and discrimination complaint against the corporation on July 20.

The action does not name Sledgehammer Games, the Activision-owned game development team that created "Vanguard." Sledgehammer studio head Aaron Halon, on the other hand, brought up the lawsuit at the start of a recent media preview for the game, calling the allegations "devastating."

Following that, the “Vanguard” briefing resorted to a more standard script, with devs detailing the current game's features and why they think they'll appeal to gamers.

The highlights of the preview focused on some of the game's specifics rather than the game's predictable WW2-themed plot premise. (The good guys are battling Nazis.) The creators demonstrated gameplay footage of how objects and set pieces in “Vanguard's” maps would respond when the shooting started, which was the highlight of the presentation. Gunfire from behind a bookcase toppled volumes from shelves and ripped their pages, creating a new, clean sightline and scattering the books on the floor with bullet holes.

“Vanguard” will offer a dynamic that most war simulation fans have only seen in EA's Battlefield series, where walls or buildings disintegrate under bombardment from tanks or rocket-propelled grenades, with windows shattering under a hail of bullets and explosions bursting holes through walls. The game will use a newer version of the game engine, which was originally seen in “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare” in 2019. Players will be able to mount their weapons on items once again, such as a table or box, and will also be able to slide them around flat surfaces while maintaining cover.

A multiplayer feature dubbed Champion Hill will be added to “Vanguard,” which will put eight teams against one another in a round-robin style event. The mode will be playable in solos, duos, and trios, and will take place in a "four-map arena." The devs defined the game as a mix of battle royale and the 2v2 Gunfight mode launched with 2019's "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare," promising further details in the coming weeks. The popular Zombies mode, which will be controlled by Treyarch, another Activision-owned company, and will build on the mythology contained in last year's game "Call of Duty: Vanguard," will also be included as a mode for "Vanguard." Black Ops Cold War.”

The game's Gunsmith feature will allow players to personalize their loadouts by introducing "custom ballistics" for guns.

At the game's launch, Sledgehammer promised a total of 20 maps (including four 2v2 maps).

“Vanguard” will link to Call of Duty's battle royale game, “Warzone,” just like “Black Ops Cold War.” Most importantly, “Vanguard's” release will bring an entirely new map to “Warzone” this year from Raven Software's developers, as well as anti-cheat software to combat the hackers who have plagued the game for much of its 17-month existence.

This is the second time Sledgehammer has worked on a WWII-themed “Call of Duty” game. The studio's 2017 entry, "Call of Duty: World War II," chronicled the challenges of an American regiment as it advanced from Normandy, France, into Germany. Throughout multiple conflicts, “Vanguard” will follow a multinational team of the Allies' best warriors. The soldiers will organize the world's first Special Forces team and investigate “Project Phoenix,” the Nazis' plan to resurrect the Third Reich once it became evident that Germany would lose the war.

A British paratrooper, a hotshot American pilot from the Pacific theater, an Australian tanker who fought in North Africa, and a Russian sniper who helped save Stalingrad will all be part of the unit. Sledgehammer's creators indicated that all of the characters are loosely based on genuine troops from the conflict, but that they don't feel "beholden" to history. This unit's activities are unlikely to be mentioned in a Ken Burns documentary.

For the past 16 years, a new Call of Duty game has been launched every fall. The previous two installments, "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare" and "Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War," were the best-selling games of 2019 and 2020, respectively. “Call of Duty: Warzone,” a free-to-play battle royale game, and “Call of Duty: Smartphone,” a free-to-play mobile game, have also brought in a lot of money for Activision Blizzard. According to the publisher, the former surpassed 100 million downloads early this year, while the latter has more than 500 million globally. Over the last year, the franchise has played a crucial role in Activision Blizzard's stock price skyrocketing.

All of this happened before the Department of Fair Employment and Housing in California filed its lawsuit. Now, "Vanguard's" performance may serve as a barometer for whether the lawsuit's actions will change customer behavior: the yearly ritual of buying the next Call of Duty game.

“Any form of harassment goes against everything we stand for,” Halon stated at the press conference before declining to speak further on the complaint.