Activision recently hosted Call of Duty NEXT, the showcase designed to present the future of the COD ecosystem. During the show, countless changes were revealed to be coming to Warzone in the next few months, with a pivotal makeover taking place when Black Ops 6 is released at the end of October.
The team revealed a new small-form map, Area 99, and they confirmed that in 2025, Verdansk will make a return as a large-scale map, but elsewhere, some sizeable changes are in the pipeline.
Read on to learn about everything changing in Warzone soon.
Refreshing
Area 99 promises to be an exciting, fast-paced map for those who love a bit of Resurgence. It’s an ‘atomic-themed’ map centred around a nuclear power plant, which links it quite nicely with Black Ops’ Nuketown map.
When Black Ops 6 is released on October 25, Warzone will prepare to receive a stack of updates, including the adoption of the new ‘Omnimovement’ mechanics being introduced with the next iteration of the Black Ops series. As you’d expect, every weapon and most of the equipment from Black Ops 6 will also be brought into Warzone.
With the ‘Carry Forward’ mechanism applying this time around, Activision’s teams will be porting almost every weapon from MWII and MWIII into the newest version of Warzone.
On the topic of weapons, players will now be able to carry a melee weapon into Warzone as a third selection. When it comes to Perks, users will be able to pick three Perks that they drop into the Warzone with, as well as a ‘Wildcard’, which hasn’t been seen in the Call of Duty ecosystem for several years. It’s the first time Wildcards will be available in Warzone’s five-year history.
For completionists, Activision will be stacking up the challenges in Warzone. This will give players something to grind for, and the assortment of challenges will include weapon mastery tasks, reticle challenges, and ‘Dark Ops Calling Card’ challenges, the nature of which is being kept under wraps.
But There’s More
It doesn’t end there.
Raven Software revealed that the backpack mechanic is being stripped from the game and that the inventory management function is going back to basics. Everything from money to your armour plates will be kept in an easily accessible menu that makes cumbersome backpacks a thing of the past.
Satchels are making a return, though. When you pick them up, you’ll either boost your armour plate storage or your ammunition capacity.
Raven has also tweaked many of the in-game mechanics tied to movement and quality-of-life features. For instance, using ziplines and ascenders has been made much more streamlined, and live ping duration has been decreased to stop the markers from obscuring your vision.
Finally, it was confirmed that when the first season of Black Ops 6 and Warzone arrives later this year, it’ll bring with it Battle Royale Ranked Play, which is good news for the more competitive players on the platform.
For more Insider Gaming coverage, check out the news that Verdansk is coming back to Warzone
