Modern Warfare 2 will be a direct sequel to 2019’s Modern Warfare reboot, which brought the extremely popular modern setting of the classic Call of Duty 4 into the previous generation (well, then current) alongside some returning characters, albeit with a new storyline.
No concrete release date was given, but that’s hardly a huge mystery - the yearly release schedule is still kicking, with Microsoft maintaining it until current Activision projects run their course amid the acquisition. Modern Warfare 2 will be 2022’s CoD game, and they almost always release sometime in November. The details came from Infinity Ward Co-Studio Head Pat Kelly who spoke a bit about the upcoming title during the call. Part of the reason why the announcement came with such little fanfare was that, as Kelly put it, the game coming was “obvious”. Modern Warfare sold 30 million copies since its 2019 launch, marking significant success. Possibly even more interesting was the admission that, fittingly, Modern Warfare 2 would also bring with it an entirely new Warzone experience. The new Call of Duty title will run on an entirely new engine that is being developed for it, so as to avoid integration issues - to which current players are no strangers - a new Warzone game will also be released instead of dragging the current one out further. Warzone has been suffering issues recently, which have only snowballed as time goes on and now turned into something of controversy among the fandom. Most recently, buy stations have been glitching, but these aren’t the only problems. Kelly addressed these issues, stating that Warzone is in a “broken state” and that fixes are on the way. Even so, a new era is about to dawn in Warzone with the release of the sequel alongside Modern Warfare 2 later this year. We’re going to assume there will be a small difference between the two launches, as there was with Modern Warfare and Warzone, but the shared new engine will make integration seamless. Warzone 2 will apparently feature more than just a new engine and prettier visuals. Kelly went on to speak about the new battle royale sequel, describing it as “disruptive” and a “massive evolution of Battle Royale". While these are mostly just buzzwords, marginally more concrete was the tease of an “incredibly ambitious sandbox mode” which makes it sound like Infinity Ward is planning to crib from Battlefield Portal. We also assume the free-to-play model is here to stay, since this approach worked wonders for Warzone so far, making it skyrocket to the upper echelons of the battle royale genre, which is a hugely competitive market. This will make it much easier for players to migrate to the new title than it would be with any kind of paywall involved. We expect to hear more about Modern Warfare 2 and Warzone 2 in the coming months.
