Why Call of Duty: Ghosts discarded old multiplayer modes

Innovation can be difficult for Call of Duty after so many years, so Activision and Infinity Ward decided to start from scratch when thinking of new multiplayer modes for Ghosts.

Ozzie Mejia

September 27, 2013 4:30 PM

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After ruling the multiplayer space for almost ten years, innovation can be a bit difficult. So Activision and Infinity Ward decided to go back to the drawing board with multiplayer game modes and start entirely from scratch. This process has led to some of the new modes in Call of Duty: Ghosts, like Search & Rescue and Cranked.

"We took the list of game modes and we cut it away," executive producer Mark Rubin told Game Informer. "The idea was to go through and pull each one out and go, 'TDM [Team Deathmatch]... should we keep it? Well, let's talk about why we should keep it.'"

After discussing which game modes need to be refined, members of Infinity Ward's multiplayer team will pitch ideas for whole new game modes, which will then be tested extensively on maps from previous games, like Modern Warfare 3. Rubin cites this as the process behind Search & Rescue.

You may notice one of your favorite game modes might be gone from Ghosts on release day, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's gone forever. "They can still be put back into the game, it's not like they're gone," Rubin said. "There's playlists--I can update them tomorrow and there'll be something completely different."

Ozzie Mejia

Senior Editor

Ozzie has been playing video games since picking up his first NES controller at age 5. He has been into games ever since, only briefly stepping away during his college years. But he was pulled back in after spending years in QA circles for both THQ and Activision, mostly spending time helping to push forward the Guitar Hero series at its peak. Ozzie has become a big fan of platformers, puzzle games, shooters, and RPGs, just to name a few genres, but he’s also a huge sucker for anything with a good, compelling narrative behind it. Because what are video games if you can't enjoy a good story with a fresh Cherry Coke?