Make no mistake, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare is just as awesome as everyone is telling you it is. Not only is the multiplayer Beta wowing gamers across the world, but at this week’s Activate Asia 2007 conference we got to chance to play even more of the single player and it is simply astounding. This is true next-gen! While we were deep in combat, we had a chance to chat to the company’s studio head (and all-round top bloke) Grant Collier and asked whether CoD5 would continue in the modern environment. His response was all nonchalance as he didn’t think he was going to be making it.
The reason behind this is found in CoD3. Infinity Ward is owned by Activision, who want their killer Call of Duty franchise to appear on Christmas shelves every year. Grant and his team were not willing to rush their next project to meet such a deadline so they came to a simple truce: Infinity Ward got two years to make CoD4, and stand-in developer Treyarch took care of CoD3 in the interim. While certainly not confirmed, it appears that such an approach will be taken again in 2008, leaving CoD6 as the next likely Infinity Ward project. Well, alongside the development of more maps (confirmed), weapons (confirmed), perks (confirmed), attachments (confirmed) and a co-op mode (rumoured) as DLC for CoD4.
While considered a decent game, it is generally agreed upon by most critics that the Treyarch developed CoD3 still paled in comparison to the awesome CoD2. This has us a little worried about a potential CoD5 going outside of Infinity Ward, but when the disparity in quality was put to Grant he actually had a lot of respect for the beleaguered Treyarch. In his eyes, at least, the game they turned around in a relatively small eight months was quite good. With that in mind, if Activision are already aware that someone else will need to do CoD5 if they want it out next year, then they should be able to give Treyarch more warning. Which should mean a better game, regardless of setting.