After the release of Infinite Warfare, many Call of Duty players have started to realize the series has grown stale, despite Infinite Warfare's addition of Combat Rigs, a solid campaign, and several new modes. Here are some of my personal ideas on how Sledgehammer can make Call of Duty 2017 fresh as well as ideas I have heard throughout the community. These are just some of my thoughts(not in any order), so feel free tell me what you think in the comments.
1. Boots on the Ground![]
A lot of players want boots on the ground instead of the vertical movement in Infinite Warfare, as many players were more excited for Modern Warfare Remastered than Infinite Warfare. This is an obvious choice that Sledgehammer can do in 2017. No exo boost jumps or wall running.
2. Prequel to Advanced Warfare?[]
The campaign should be a prequel to Advanced Warfare and could possibly bridge the gap between the Modern Era and the Futuristic Era. The campaign would still be boots on the ground, but feature a mix of modern and future tech like predator missiles, improved AC-130, futuristic knives, an early version of the walker tank we saw in AW, and semi futuristic light machine guns(no lasers) just for example. We could also see a younger Jonathon Irons played by Kevin Spacey again, as he was one of the best characters in Advanced Warfare.
3. Replace Old Multiplayer Modes with New Ones![]
If Call of Duty 2017 wants to feel fresh, it need to get rid of old gamemodes like team deathmatch, kill confirmed, capture the flag, etc. and replace all of them with new modes(or just make the old modes have completely different mechanics). This is especially evident on PC, where there is almost no one playing any mode besides team deathmatch. Reviewers and players usually like or dislike a Call of Duty game based on the multiplayer, so it is important that Sledgehammer makes Call of Duty feel different from the others starting with the multiplayer.
For example:
- Team Deathmatch could be two teams of 6 players, each with an AI controlled Walker Tank on their team and the first team to destroy the other team's Walker Team wins.
- A new mode, called Escort, where one team of 8 players defend a moving convoy of Humvee's from the other team, who try to destroy the convoy.
- Capture the Flag is basically uplink with 2 flags, so make capture the flag a hybrid of CTF and Uplink where there are two satellite drones
- A new mode, Hostage Taker, where one team tries to rescue a single hostage while the other team defends the hostage from being taken
- A new mode, Assassinate, where one team of 6 players tries to kill a player controlled VIP guarded by 5 players(6 including the VIP)
The Escort mode would require specialized maps for the mode, but Battlefront already has specialized maps for certain modes, so why can't Call of Duty?
4. Dedicated Servers![]
Hopefully better than this server.
This is pretty obvious. Why Activision hasn't forced Infinity Ward, Treyarch, and Sledgehammer to implement this is beyond me. This would really help the PC gaming community as well as consoles so an online game does not have to migrate hosts every time the host leaves.
5. A Different Co-op Mode Other than Zombies!(With more than 1 map on the disc!)[]
Exo Zombies and Zombies in Spaceland are interesting to say the least, but are not as good as Treyarch Zombies. If we have zombies every year than Call of Duty will feel stale very fast. Extinction was a good start, but it needed to have more replayablilty than it currently has, as it only came with one map on the disc. Having more than one map for the Co-op mode would make the mode more attractive to players who might not like one of the maps(looking at you Shadows of Evil!). Spec Ops and MW3 Survival were pretty fun, while exo survival and Ghosts' safeguard mode did not seem to be as good. Some of my fondest memories of Call of Duty are playing splitscreen on those modes. Speaking of splitscreen...
6. Four Player Splitscreen![]
Why is it that the only Call of Duty on PS4/Xbox One that has four player splitscreen is Black Ops 3? Every game from Modern Warfare to Black Ops 2 had four player splitscreen, and many players consider those games to be when Call of Duty was at its prime. I wouldn't mind a graphics downgrade while playing splitscreen if I could play with three other friends. There are very few good four player games on PS4/Xbox One, and Call of Duty could conquer that demographic easily if they implemented this feature.
7. Real Life Weapons![]
What is this?
I don't mind a few made up weapons, but using real life weapons really immerses you in the game. It makes the game seem more like a military shooter rather than an arcade shooter.
8. A Soundtrack They Actually Use![]
Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 - Opening Cinematic Intro 720p
Listen to the video on the right about 12 seconds in. The music sets the serious tone of Modern Warfare 2's campaign the music throughout the game, while not iconic, enhances gameplay in every way. It's not that recent Call of Duty games don't have good music, but the music is either too quiet or isn't even used at all. Even on the home screen on Modern Warfare 3 and Black Ops 2, the music playing gets the player in the mood for the kind of game they are going to play.
9. Less Aggressive Supply Drops[]
Supply Drops are really shady.
Ever since Advanced Warfare, supply drops have become extremely annoying and seem like an extreme cash grab by Activision. Sledgehammer should make supply drops only have personalization items or get rid of supply drops all together.
Thanks for reading my list. I hope Call of Duty 2017 has some of these features in order to make Call of Duty fresh again. Did I miss any thing? Let me know in the comments and I'll add it to the blog.