Sledgehammer Games released Call of Duty (COD): World War 2 last week, and the series’ return to the second world war was a great move that was very well received by fans and critics alike. However, it appears that that wasn’t always the plan, with the developer initially wanting to continue on with their first game in the series.
This was revealed by Activision CEO Eric Hirshberg, who said that Sledgehammer Games originally wanted to make COD: Advanced Warfare 2. However, after the increasingly negative response from fans regarding the futuristic approach the series kept going in, Activision appears to have instructed them to take things back to World War 2.
However, Hirshberg said that he felt that they would be the perfect team for the job, because he knew that “they would become historians, that they would tackle it with authenticity, give it tremendous care and we also knew they would capture the unspeakable scale of World War II.”
Taking the series back to its roots was definitely the right move to make, because the futuristic setting simply wasn’t gelling with the entire fanbase. This issue came to a head last year with the release of COD: Infinite Warfare, with that game’s announcement trailer being one of the most disliked videos on YouTube of all time. It was further pummeled by the release of Battlefield 1, which featured gameplay set in World War 1 and ended up causing many people to jump ship to that franchise for their FPS fix.
Even still, it is a shame that Sledgehammer Games wasn’t able to continue what they started. COD: Advanced Warfare was seen by many as a very solid installment in the series, and it would have been interesting to see where they would have taken it. It’s always possible that the series returns to a futuristic setting in the future, but for now it looks like the series will be sticking with its roots.
COD: World War II is available now for PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.
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