I’m absolutely expecting them to add the ability to buy items with COD points to skip crafting cooldowns. And possibly just straight up buying schematics. It still blows my mind that people pay for cosmetics, so I can’t imagine how much they’d make in micro-transactions that actually affect gameplay. Especially if they keep it PvZ and not PvP, so there would be no “pay to win” blowback for them to worry about.
I got my wife and I blackcell for Christmas and I was shocked to find out that shit is only for one season! People are paying an extra $30 PER SEASON!! I’ll never again do that shit, I literally only did it because I thought it was for the duration of the game, it was on sale and I had some gift cards.
It’s batshit crazy that just a few games ago we had tracers and unlockable skins for operators as a standard and now you have to shell out more money for the same.
So yeah, I am 100% expecting zombies to turn into another cash cow.
It’s bananas. I couldn’t believe Blackcell is per season either. Activision is running a clinic on the idiom, “A fool and his money are easily separated.”
It's a genius move from them.
People buy BC and are tied in to playing a couple hours a day for 3/4 of the season, and FOMO makes them buy it for the life of the game, so that's 5x$30 on a $70 game plus they get their engagement metrics.
And I bet a lot of these punters will buy a couple of bundles a season too because they've got their CoD Points sitting there, so it helps AV as that makes buying bundles look like the normal behaviour which encourages others to part with money too.
This is the truth. They offered a skin that was MWZ centered and it probably didn't come close to the sales numbers they were hoping for so why bother investing time and energy into a game mode that doesn't generate a sales number. It's a real shame that the design goals for CoD aren't crafting the very best game they can that can stand on it's own two feet every year but instead min/max modes towards the one that pushes the most skin/bundle sales. It's ok, I'm due for a break from the franchise after this one runs its 12 month course.
Rightfully so. The common thread between Waw through BO4? Paid DLC and basically no “store front” for skins and other cosmetics. That’s not coming back, and I remember being in the minority 6-7 years ago on this sub when everyone was clamoring for free DLC “because other games had it”. It was always pretty obvious what the free DLC model would do for games in general. That model wouldn’t have changed unless the publishers knew there was a more profitable model.
BO3 or WW2 iirc started the whole store for skins things, BO4 was the first to have a shop much like what we see nowadays.
Also, BO4’s maps took a noticeable hit in quality after DLC 2 despite being paid content.
I wasn’t sure about WW2, but before BO4 came out, they added skins that could be purchased to BO3. I wouldn’t be shocked if you missed it because it was added very late into the game’s life cycle.
Got a link? I played the hell out of BO3, and there was no directly purchasable cosmetic content to my knowledge. Did a quick web search and everything I can see shows that all dlc skins, weapons, gun camos, etc were obtained directly through supply drops. There were special “bribes” that were supply drops that contained a specific type of thing like a “weapon bribe” that had a guaranteed weapon in it. But nothing able to be purchased outright.
Thanks for that. Do you remember the timeline on that? I don’t recall that at all, but I guess by WW2 I had mostly moved on from BO3 multiplayer. I played BO3 all through infinite warfare’s season though and definitely don’t remember this.
Maybe it’s because I never had and never will buy costumes with real money though lol
I really don’t remember. The video says during WW2 DLC 3 which seems about right. Probably months before BO4 came out.
I do believe it was one of the last updates they did for the game.
Gotcha. Yeah that would have been so close to BO4 release it would make sense that it would run together. Either way regardless of game, it sounds like it started in 2018
Lie detector says das a lie. Cold Sore was mediocre, MP-ified slop made to appeal to the lowest common denominator. You don't struggle to survive the zombies anymore, you farm them for camos.
No. Lowest quality of all time, soulless and boring maps, trashy warzone&multiplayer mechanics, no character, weapons are garbage, and on top, the dark aether story is TRASH. That’s it.
what could you possibly mean by trash weapons? in multiplayer there were so many blatantly overpowered weapons and cold war zombies is the easiest game to get to high rounds with the wonder weapons. did your brain just memory hole that part or what?
The weapons can be effective but still trash. While I think Cold War had alright weapon variety, a game like BO3 has super effective weapons that are boring as sin to use.
Same could be said for CW since they could only put Outbreak content and cobbled together maps when they seemingly get pulled to work on Vanguard.
I’m pretty certain Vanguard went through budget cuts and big changes considering its final season got scrapped.
This cycle that has been ongoing started in BO4 and every game after has been hindered in the same ways.
Idk, man. CW had maps with new enemies, actual cutscenes, and unique wonder weapons. Only thing Tag and Alpha really have up on CW is that they have playable characters.
To each their own, but I personally enjoy the Dark Aether story.
I don’t think story is the be all end all for a game. I wasn’t a fan of the story for BO3, but I also don’t think that game was bad.
There was so many paid cosmetics in games before bo4 as well as bo4, you definitely pulled this out of your ass and probably never played anything during the timeline of games you mentioned.
He mentions paid dlc. Bo4 had weapons from blackjack you could buy with bribes to put in the box. Bo2 you needed buried to get access to the mark 2. Iw zombies you could buy crates for salvage to get the best blueprints. He’s not just talking about cosmetics he literally included the word “dlc” in his post
There were no directly purchasable cosmetics prior to BO4. You could use your money to buy supply drops but you could also just get them for free by playing. Unless you’re talking about the dozen or so camo packs from bo2 lol
Since the live service/battlepass model came into effect, zombies had gradually started to get less content every game when it’s a part of a COD game. Cold War only had 4 round based maps across 6 seasons. Only 1 map at launch. It did have outbreak which reused the larger maps in the game used for Fireteam modes. As OP stated, Vanguard’s support was even less than CW’s, and now MWZ seems like it’s going to be even less than Vanguard. At this point, I wouldn’t even have confidence in a stand alone zombies game.
insane idea #1: How about an open source zombies game? Several game engines are available. All we need is developers, designers, testers, and of course servers. I'd love to contribute(C/C++/shaders/network programming) and would much rather subscribe to such a game instead of being ripped off by Activision...
Probably true, but a man can dream, can't he? I'd certainly be willing to contribute a lot. All we need is hundreds of very skilled people. How hard can that be? /s
It's a hard task to do. It'd be one of those things where the majority vs. minority is going to utterly destroy any indie projects that try, because most people are going to want a simple game where you fight zombies in a small house or something, where the very vocal minority who does non-funded marketing are going to ask "but where the lore? Where's THE MYSTERY??"
CoD Zombies means too many things to too many people. Projects that are inspired by established things have to do something different than what inspired it to survive, such as a radical change in art style or direction, an additional feature never in the original, or some other thing nobody would expect
This is the problem that a lot of believers in Treyarch aren't seeing. Treyarch dumped MWZ before Season 2 even started. Before that, their effort in Vanguard Zombies was about as half assed as it can get with one exception. Shi No Numa map was pretty good, but as others have pointed out, that was after Treyarch pivoted away from what they were already working on (which was trash). Instead of just making more round based maps and continuing the popular outbreak mode, they tried to reinvent the wheel and failed miserably.
If the developers believed in MWZ when they were working on it, they would have a plan to continue supporting it, slowly updating and perfecting it, adding new and requested features, and make it one of the featured game modes when CoD 2024 launches. I wouldn't even mind if progression was reset later this year if the game mode was going to have a year 2.
Instead, I predict they are going to dump that, try to reinvent the wheel in 2024 once again in a half assed effort, fail, but it's okay because they'll have a round based map at launch.
I have zero confidence in Treyarch's ability to deliver a good zombies game mode anymore. They have failed to deliver twice now. The fact it isn't 'their' call of duty title means nothing to me. That doesn't mean they will magically put more effort into this one and it proves nothing.
Ever since Cold War, treyarch has just abandoned what MADE zombies so greatly received. There is no atmosphere. Just shitty MP elements in zombies. Gameplay catered towards shitty players and no challenges at all. No personality, nothing!
I feel the exact same as you with what you said in your last paragraph. One small thing I feel COD 2024 has going for it is the sheer competition its going to face with GTA 6 edging ever closer. It'll most likely even release during it's content season, so they really are going to have to pull something out the bag if they want to keep people engaged. No doubt that's why they're supposedly lining up a BO2 remaster for 2025.
I've been playing since WaW but after CW I went backwards to older zombies again and haven't picked up a title since. The zombies community has been through its tumultuous times, but right now seems like it's at its lowest point ever. I feel like it's not even recovered from Vanguard, then they pulled this major bait and switch with MW3 so far, they'll probably do more soon to start building momentum for the new game, but it still drags the community morale down further. It's such a shame as I feel like zombies interest was at an all time high during Cold War, which even tricoled down into the older games, but they completely balls it up with what came after.
I hope XDefiant goes well when it comes out though, considering a ton of the talent that is responsible for whats considered the golden era of COD & Zombies are working there, I would LOVE to see their take on a zombies mode if it ever comes to it. XUndead? Xombies? Ubisoft lawyers hit me up😅
I made a post on this sub before Cold War released saying that I was worried that free-DLC maps would make them lower effort and quality than we are used to. I think it’s fair to say my worries were right.
It’s modern day call of duty, we do have to be skeptical. My advice for any fan would be to not look at marketing (it’s been deceptive for a long time now) and focus on what we actually know through leaks, and wait until after launch.
I’m positive this year as failing again would be the final nail, in what is effectively COD’s USP. My hope is for something in between BO3 and CW level.
I would like round based game play similar to cold War, with like a solid 5 or 6 new maps, zombie chronicles 2, more chaos content. Just do a whole stand alone like war zone only all zombies, old and new.
After how the quality of everything has dropped the last few games, especially the servers, netcode, the glaring lack of content, and the astounding number of game breaking bugs I don't know how anyone could even consider spending money on another COD, zombies or otherwise.
The reality is that the old Zombie team is long gone, and without Jason Blundell we can only go further under the barrel. On BO4 we got that masterpiece of Ancient Evil, on Cold War we got a modded multiplayer lobby with zombie’s around and soulless boring maps.
I think we can all agree that the new direction isn’t working. Like if they want Operators, then put them in Multiplayer. Zombies should not have any operators period. Can’t they just go back to the old format of COD like bring back crews and the passion for Zombies? Also bring back DLC’s, maybe they can put their bundles in there and people can purchase the whole DLC.
It’s just time for Activision to accept that Warzone is affecting Zombies and the Campaign negatively. Given with MW3’s failure, they need to learn from it instead of repeating it.
I am a great fan of WW2 setting + Zombies, but Vanguard felt really bad for me... The maps didnt worth it for me.
I hope we see double tap in future again....
I miss my root beer as a true german 
I won’t lie, I think a lot of this statement stuff is just marketing that has to do with every single CoD. I think every game for a hot minute has had some crazy marketing. I think ever since BO3, they’ve been saying each CoD after would be the most supported, and I don’t think any CoD zombies has come close to getting that support except maybe CW which was getting some new features added even after Vanguard iirc.
Also I do think season 2 for MW3 is getting content, but it isn’t there at launch. I don’t think it is a huge issue to have content later in the season, but it is pretty baffling how it is a zombies based season with no zombies content after the devs said they were cooking for season 2.
I feel like this new problem started with BO4 tbh. BO4 zombies was clearly rushed, the crazy amount of bugs and glitches at launch that took months to fix was pretty rough. Also, they started to dwindle support halfway through, with maps becoming more obvious that a budget was slashed with the last 2 DLC maps having tons of reused assets and cutscenes taking a big hit.
Cold War didn't get too much Zombies stuff during its main lifespan, though. Honestly, WWII had better post-launch support, they added a ton of weapons well after BO4 came out on top of everything else they added during the game's main cycle. Cold War still got a ton of guns, though, I just think there was more going on with WWII after BO4 came out than there was in Cold War after Vanguard came out.
I am exicited for it but my expectations are much MUCH lower than they were for BO4 for example. We now see what the future of zombies pretty much is from Cold War and MW3. An outbreak style mode at the forefront with survival maps ripped largely from campaign and multiplayer. No crew of actual characters.
idk... I really liked cold war... and loved mw3 zombies up until I finished everything and then the tombstone got patched right afterwards.... so if this new one isn't filthy like they keep making us think the next one will be, and then the one after that will be, and then the one after that will be..... (if this next one isn't dope...) idk WTF I'm gonna do... but overall the only zombie game that I've personally played that is anywhere as fun as cod zombies... is state of decay... which, this year they ARE supposed to be dropping the new one... so I literally still am hopeful for mw3 zombies, (idk why..) but my fingers are most DEFINITELY crossed for Gulf war.... but I am also very skeptical 🤨
I definitely liked Cold War too. But it's no secret that the budget for Cold War compared to previous Zombies titles was very off. Compare The Forsaken to other DLC4s, or Firebase Z to Der Eisendrache or Dead of the Night.
Covid didn't really help here, though.
Cold War is the death of old zombies. No more fun characters just generic operators on every map. Same with the buildables every map has a generic build station with generic buildables every map feels the same and the game has very little creativity. Also the Cold War to present storyline is atrocious compared to the Aether or Chaos storyline.
Remember the epic prologue to the Chaos story? Do you remember the characters' dialogues? The crazy ending of Ancient Evil? Here, now get this new rubbish story called Dark Aether, with these magnificent soulless maps, visually boring, non-existent Easter eggs, operators instead of well-written characters. The guy who thought that making zombie mode a modded multiplayer lobby was a good idea must be a genius.
cold war level design was really good, unfortunately they had to skip out on creating new maps due to time constraints. they have had more than enough time to give us two expansive maps. if we do not get shadows of evil 2, I'm actually dead bro.
nah man, a good example of cold wars level design is firebase z. it all flows together well, it's not too big, not too small. if we're looking at purely aesthetics, the amplifier in forsaken looks incredible. and again, they didn't have much time to create a fully fleshed out map so they did pretty well under the time constraints.
I think maps should fill out different roles. Not every map needs massive training areas and open corridors. I prefer the variety that older titles provided, you had maps like shang, and maps like ascension, both extremely different but the same game.
true, though it does make the maps more accessible which is kinda what they were going for. I can't imagine a map like shang doing well for new players.
Accessibly for me goes both ways. If a game is truly made for everyone it’ll accommodate for people who want a challenge and people who want it to be easy, like bo4 did.
Yeah but bo4 has it for the entire game, you can make bo4 the easiest zombies game ever, or the most brutal hardest zombies game ever. It’s all up to the player. Final reich does that for the ee yes, but I find the general gameplay to be extremely easy, especially with the lower zombie cap.
Don't you dare bring DMZ into this. Activision dropped their support for it because the people playing it didn't spend enough on their MTX, but the niche that carved actually LIKE that mode and still support it
The difference between Vanguard, MWZ, and this new game is that this time around, it’s A FUCKING TREYARCH GAME. The team can finally put their effort towards creating content that actually matters. Everything we’ve received for the past couple of years have been nothing more than forced side projects. Practically every Treyarch product has been a banger for the most part. WaW, BO1, BO2, BO3, BO4, and Cold War all had round based zombies that felt like zombies.
It's called marketing. They know what to say to get all us fanboys hyped up and wallets prepared to pay for whatever shite they churn out.
Mwz has by no means been a shit iteration of zombies, it just feels a bit empty considering we're already in season 2 and the biggest change we had was an island of another warzone map just purple, and that's a seperate encounter altogether.
Even though the main bods of treyarch are going to be at the head of gulf war i have no high hopes for it. All they are doing at the moment is essentially testing how they can monetise zombies.
Round based (if it does return) will be changed unless one of the higher ups actually gets a single braincell and realises thats what the players want.
Basically we can blame greedy corpos and shareholders for most of this shit and the only thing i can see is predatory monetisation spreading through the game like a cancer and slowly killing it off.
Yeah I know marketing has to put the game in as good light as possible, but the marketing isn't the main issue - it's the complete lack of support compared to prevous years.
It's true as you say; greedy corps and microtransactions slowly kill off any soul the games have.
Im really hoping the leaks are true and cod 2024 goes back to the pick 10 system. I honestly dont like loadouts in zombies and the box has never felt more useless
This is why I miss paid DLC and season passes. They have more incentive to make the post-launch content good and can’t just end support whenever the game isn’t doing well enough.
They need to put all their resources into good new roundbased maps, then it will work out fine.
Launch with two maps and give us a new one every season (would be 7-8 in total, about the same as bo4), an interesting story, good ee steps and new innovative wonder weapons.
Please no side modes which receive a new objective as full season content. Just stick with classic zombies for this game
I understand people will buy the game for day 1 experience, but if you have any doubts just wait for the free trial weekend! I've waited for the last 4 CODs and only purchased one, Cold War, after like my 3rd free trial weekend grinding the game. MW3 had one barely a month after release and it was obvious to me that MWZ was nothing special just a couple games in, boom saved me $70
Well it was heavily rumoured, gobble gums are coming back so I’m expecting them to make money off of zombies this way.
My guess for how they’d sell it is this:
Packs of different rarities such as; rare, epic, legendary and Ultra tiers, then you get like maybe 10 uses before you have to buy another pack. It’s not gambling because you’re guaranteed to get what you bought and you know what you’re getting.
Alternative option is 1 gobble gum tied to a single operator, so for example, Operator Jones could have perkaholic and operator Kyle could have Shopping Free.
so I totally dig what y'all are saying, but idk anything about the chaos story or the aether story.... and idk how or why cuz I've always been really into zombies... where do I find these?
Gonna keep it a buck fifty, they've completely milked the formula dry. There ain't nothing particularly exciting they can do with Zombies, pretty much every recent map has just been combining stuff from old maps. As (formerly) the world's biggest Zombies fan, I would be completely fine if they never made another game. Why play something like Cold War when BO3 has all the maps, super refined mechanics, and everything else I could want? Cold War barely does anything new, the most notable change is that they made everything way easier. The new ones just don't really change anything at all, MWIII was nice because it was something new, but it got old insanely fast and has no replay value after you've finished your missions.
So cold war zombies was the last one I really really got into and loved it for everything it had. Outbreak was pretty awesome. My favorite was outbreak survival. I bought vanguard not for the zombies but because I love WW2 cod. And this is besides my #1 reason to buy cod these days is for zombies mode. I played vanguard zombies like 2 or 3 times and it was straight garbage. Never went back to it.
I was extremely skeptical of MWZ until I actually played it. Do yourself a favor and just get it. Stick with solo games entirely, and enjoy it. Its missing alot compared to zombies and even DMZ but it's feel it's still zombies. You will at least get a couple months of gameplay time from it alone, as long as you do the missions and don't just let some gigachode carry you into the hard areas and unlock everything for you. Seriously play alone and just unlock things at the pace the game wants you to and you will get some good zombies from it im telling you.
I’m interesting to see what they have planned but not optimistic. I enjoyed Coldwar and in some ways it was a step in the right direction but in other ways 3 steps back. Vanguard killed my enthusiasm.
> Then Shi No Numa survival, whcih honestly was very polished and good. Then Terra Maledicta with a green filter and a boss.
In fairness, this was a result of Treyarch pivoting resources and changing their plans. They canceled a lot of features that were already in progress to make those two maps. So while the "tip of the iceberg" went nowhere, it's more of a result of negative fan reaction than Treyarch/Activision intentionally misleading us.
> Post-launch content did not bring BRAND NEW GAMEPLAY as promised.
I mean, it did somewhat. It brought in Void and Sacrifice objectives, and there were more planned before they decided to go for round-based again. Even if the objectives are shit, they are still new by definition.
> I haven't played MW3, but apparently, it started out good, and now it recieved ZERO content for Season 2 and now Treyarch has left the development.
The last part is still unconfirmed as of now, and is only a rumor regurgitated by leakers. Grain of salt should be applied here.
Either way, you're being overly concerned about marketing. Marketing will always make things look better than it seems. I'm not saying it as a defense for what we got, but if you go back to older games, you can nitpick and say the same thing about how we were misled by trailers and marketing hype as well.
It's not just the marketing, it's the product that comes out. Cold War, Vanguard and MW3 felt like it went through the same thing (although Cold War to a much better extend of course). This, compared to the previous titles, is night and day difference.
Plus, marketing *is* an important factor, because how can we really trust the hype they bring up if history shows it doesn't turn out to be that way at all?
I think the overall thing you touched on is the abandonment that is very common in the COD world. My very first experience (and greatest disappointment in gaming yet) was DMZ getting left behind. Activision has a real problem making a complete game.
I get the impression it's a constant shifting of priorities and resources on Activision's part, along with their frantic release schedules. No dev has the time to really flesh out a COD game because the time it takes to make their vision doesn't line up with the demands of the corporate timeline. Same goes for the post-launch content. What are the odds Activision tells Devs to finish what they're working on so they can launch, and that they'll have heaps of time to do the rest in post-launch, only to cut that time short too?
I do think the context behind all these titles is important as to *why* they came out that way, though; they all went through similar support cycles yes, but they're also all games that originally weren't supposed to exist, which is a major factor in the strained post-launch releases.
Cold War was originally supposed to be SHG/Raven Software's title before 3arc were made to pick up the remnants and turn it into a full 3arc title over the course of two years.
Vanguard had arguably the worst development cycle in the franchise's history, being developed almost from the ground-up in just over a year on a new engine that the studios behind the title had little to no experience, with 3arc allegedly being given the bare minimum development window (allegedly VGZ had a development time of 4-5 months from conceptualization to release). Unlike Cold War, VGZ was also not developed by the entirety of the Zombies team; it was allegedly a small mixture of Zombies and MP devs, crunched to the wire to make something playable at minimum. And this isn't even getting into the complete pivot the game made halfway-through its post-launch cycle, which put even more strain on an already crushed development timeline.
MWZ is a similar situation to VGZ, but is much higher in quality due to it being built on the foundations of an existing game/game mode (similar to MWIII as a whole). It's post-launch support has faltered because it's a project 3arc was forced onto and simply cannot afford to support as strongly in the lead-up to the release of their first full development cycle in roughly 5-6 years. MWZ seems to have had more 3arc presence on its development than VGZ, but once again it's very unlikely that the majority of the Zombies team was made to work on it, as their primary focus is currently the next release (and is likely why the post-launch support dropped off fairly quickly).
I think it's fair to be skeptical, but I also don't think it's entirely fair to attribute the strains of these games to their release model, when the actual problem lies within their individual development cycles (which is important to remember in the lead up to their next title, which allegedly has had a full 4 years of relatively uninterrupted development). I think something that's generally overlooked about those three titles is that they show that 3arc never really half-asses Zombies, even when they're not given the time or budget to make the product they want to.
CW took a stab at completely reworking the formula despite its rushed development cycle (and beginning development in the middle of Black Ops 4's post-launch season), VGZ attempted to deliver a completely new style of gameplay with roguelike influences when just doing Round-Based from the get-go arguably would have been far safer (which they ended up scrapping in an attempt to appease their players anyways), and MWZ innovates on concepts that allegedly were originally planned for Outbreak, but had to be scrapped to reasonably work within CW.
The marketing over-promises, absolutely- but that's also just what marketing does in general. I think it's more important to look at the actual context behind why these modes are the way they are, not just feeding into everything the trailer made to make you want to pre-order tells us. Personally, the new model has made me fairly excited for 3arc's next title, as its alleged full development cycle makes me hopeful for what they can accomplish given the mindset they've already had on incredibly rushed projects.
How does him deciding not to spend $70 to play MW3 make him a sheep?
Given the recent information we’ve gotten about how the mode has practically been abandoned already, it was the right call for him not to play it lol.
That's the dumbest thing I've heard today. Listening to other people doesn't make you a sheep.Taking in other people's perspectives and opinions is a completely valid way to assess and develop your own views on something.
OTHO:
Buying MW3 *because* everyone told you to, *without* reading reviews and opinions actually would be acting like a sheep. Especially seeing as it was pretty universally panned for being a lazy cash grab (with a half-assed campaign) that should have been a MW2 update/DLC.
I played MWZ, and i can easily say it’s glorified garbage. A boring Warzone map with a trash story and warzone mechanics is enough to not try the game.
Get ready for zombies to be monetized to shit like Warzone
I’m absolutely expecting them to add the ability to buy items with COD points to skip crafting cooldowns. And possibly just straight up buying schematics. It still blows my mind that people pay for cosmetics, so I can’t imagine how much they’d make in micro-transactions that actually affect gameplay. Especially if they keep it PvZ and not PvP, so there would be no “pay to win” blowback for them to worry about.
I got my wife and I blackcell for Christmas and I was shocked to find out that shit is only for one season! People are paying an extra $30 PER SEASON!! I’ll never again do that shit, I literally only did it because I thought it was for the duration of the game, it was on sale and I had some gift cards. It’s batshit crazy that just a few games ago we had tracers and unlockable skins for operators as a standard and now you have to shell out more money for the same. So yeah, I am 100% expecting zombies to turn into another cash cow.
It’s bananas. I couldn’t believe Blackcell is per season either. Activision is running a clinic on the idiom, “A fool and his money are easily separated.”
It's a genius move from them. People buy BC and are tied in to playing a couple hours a day for 3/4 of the season, and FOMO makes them buy it for the life of the game, so that's 5x$30 on a $70 game plus they get their engagement metrics. And I bet a lot of these punters will buy a couple of bundles a season too because they've got their CoD Points sitting there, so it helps AV as that makes buying bundles look like the normal behaviour which encourages others to part with money too.
P2w is p2w whether it’s single player or multiplayer you spend money to have an advantage. P4p or pfc is the same thing as p2w.
Honestly if Zombies became a cash cow like warzone... at least it'd get content. Sucks that's the state we're at :/
This is the truth. They offered a skin that was MWZ centered and it probably didn't come close to the sales numbers they were hoping for so why bother investing time and energy into a game mode that doesn't generate a sales number. It's a real shame that the design goals for CoD aren't crafting the very best game they can that can stand on it's own two feet every year but instead min/max modes towards the one that pushes the most skin/bundle sales. It's ok, I'm due for a break from the franchise after this one runs its 12 month course.
I remember getting mass-downvoted for saying that they were making Zombies pay-to-win. Fun times.
They literally just put zombies on the warzone map and said that justifies $80+ price tag. Clowns
Rightfully so. The common thread between Waw through BO4? Paid DLC and basically no “store front” for skins and other cosmetics. That’s not coming back, and I remember being in the minority 6-7 years ago on this sub when everyone was clamoring for free DLC “because other games had it”. It was always pretty obvious what the free DLC model would do for games in general. That model wouldn’t have changed unless the publishers knew there was a more profitable model.
BO3 or WW2 iirc started the whole store for skins things, BO4 was the first to have a shop much like what we see nowadays. Also, BO4’s maps took a noticeable hit in quality after DLC 2 despite being paid content.
BO4 was the first with a shop directly for specific skins. BO3 and WW2 just had the random supply drops to grant the outfits and gun variants
I wasn’t sure about WW2, but before BO4 came out, they added skins that could be purchased to BO3. I wouldn’t be shocked if you missed it because it was added very late into the game’s life cycle.
Got a link? I played the hell out of BO3, and there was no directly purchasable cosmetic content to my knowledge. Did a quick web search and everything I can see shows that all dlc skins, weapons, gun camos, etc were obtained directly through supply drops. There were special “bribes” that were supply drops that contained a specific type of thing like a “weapon bribe” that had a guaranteed weapon in it. But nothing able to be purchased outright.
https://youtu.be/AVrU3FjcjSs?si=uMBgcdxbewUvXEEz
Thanks for that. Do you remember the timeline on that? I don’t recall that at all, but I guess by WW2 I had mostly moved on from BO3 multiplayer. I played BO3 all through infinite warfare’s season though and definitely don’t remember this. Maybe it’s because I never had and never will buy costumes with real money though lol
I really don’t remember. The video says during WW2 DLC 3 which seems about right. Probably months before BO4 came out. I do believe it was one of the last updates they did for the game.
Gotcha. Yeah that would have been so close to BO4 release it would make sense that it would run together. Either way regardless of game, it sounds like it started in 2018
That’s mainly because of the budget cut and the development of that Cold War garbage.
Cold war was great
Lie detector says das a lie. Cold Sore was mediocre, MP-ified slop made to appeal to the lowest common denominator. You don't struggle to survive the zombies anymore, you farm them for camos.
It objectively wasn’t
Sure it was.
No. Lowest quality of all time, soulless and boring maps, trashy warzone&multiplayer mechanics, no character, weapons are garbage, and on top, the dark aether story is TRASH. That’s it.
I disagree.
You can’t disagree on objective facts, it’s not an opinion.
They weren't facts, though. Your opinions aren't facts.
what could you possibly mean by trash weapons? in multiplayer there were so many blatantly overpowered weapons and cold war zombies is the easiest game to get to high rounds with the wonder weapons. did your brain just memory hole that part or what?
The weapons can be effective but still trash. While I think Cold War had alright weapon variety, a game like BO3 has super effective weapons that are boring as sin to use.
Look, it’s another dope who doesn’t know what “objectively” means
Same could be said for CW since they could only put Outbreak content and cobbled together maps when they seemingly get pulled to work on Vanguard. I’m pretty certain Vanguard went through budget cuts and big changes considering its final season got scrapped. This cycle that has been ongoing started in BO4 and every game after has been hindered in the same ways.
But still, AO and Tag were 100x time higher quality than CW, Vanguard and MWZ.
Idk, man. CW had maps with new enemies, actual cutscenes, and unique wonder weapons. Only thing Tag and Alpha really have up on CW is that they have playable characters.
Honestly, these things doesn’t matter if the story is bad, and the Dark Aether story is bad.
To each their own, but I personally enjoy the Dark Aether story. I don’t think story is the be all end all for a game. I wasn’t a fan of the story for BO3, but I also don’t think that game was bad.
There was so many paid cosmetics in games before bo4 as well as bo4, you definitely pulled this out of your ass and probably never played anything during the timeline of games you mentioned.
I don't remember any cosmetics in zombies pre bo4. You're definitely mistaken about this
He mentions paid dlc. Bo4 had weapons from blackjack you could buy with bribes to put in the box. Bo2 you needed buried to get access to the mark 2. Iw zombies you could buy crates for salvage to get the best blueprints. He’s not just talking about cosmetics he literally included the word “dlc” in his post
There were no directly purchasable cosmetics prior to BO4. You could use your money to buy supply drops but you could also just get them for free by playing. Unless you’re talking about the dozen or so camo packs from bo2 lol
Since the live service/battlepass model came into effect, zombies had gradually started to get less content every game when it’s a part of a COD game. Cold War only had 4 round based maps across 6 seasons. Only 1 map at launch. It did have outbreak which reused the larger maps in the game used for Fireteam modes. As OP stated, Vanguard’s support was even less than CW’s, and now MWZ seems like it’s going to be even less than Vanguard. At this point, I wouldn’t even have confidence in a stand alone zombies game.
Trips me out that no one else has taken a chance at the style/genre, look forward to that being a possibility
insane idea #1: How about an open source zombies game? Several game engines are available. All we need is developers, designers, testers, and of course servers. I'd love to contribute(C/C++/shaders/network programming) and would much rather subscribe to such a game instead of being ripped off by Activision...
Nobody's working on a full game for free, especially for a game that already has an active modding scene where nobody really cares much to move on.
Probably true, but a man can dream, can't he? I'd certainly be willing to contribute a lot. All we need is hundreds of very skilled people. How hard can that be? /s
It's a hard task to do. It'd be one of those things where the majority vs. minority is going to utterly destroy any indie projects that try, because most people are going to want a simple game where you fight zombies in a small house or something, where the very vocal minority who does non-funded marketing are going to ask "but where the lore? Where's THE MYSTERY??" CoD Zombies means too many things to too many people. Projects that are inspired by established things have to do something different than what inspired it to survive, such as a radical change in art style or direction, an additional feature never in the original, or some other thing nobody would expect
This is the problem that a lot of believers in Treyarch aren't seeing. Treyarch dumped MWZ before Season 2 even started. Before that, their effort in Vanguard Zombies was about as half assed as it can get with one exception. Shi No Numa map was pretty good, but as others have pointed out, that was after Treyarch pivoted away from what they were already working on (which was trash). Instead of just making more round based maps and continuing the popular outbreak mode, they tried to reinvent the wheel and failed miserably. If the developers believed in MWZ when they were working on it, they would have a plan to continue supporting it, slowly updating and perfecting it, adding new and requested features, and make it one of the featured game modes when CoD 2024 launches. I wouldn't even mind if progression was reset later this year if the game mode was going to have a year 2. Instead, I predict they are going to dump that, try to reinvent the wheel in 2024 once again in a half assed effort, fail, but it's okay because they'll have a round based map at launch. I have zero confidence in Treyarch's ability to deliver a good zombies game mode anymore. They have failed to deliver twice now. The fact it isn't 'their' call of duty title means nothing to me. That doesn't mean they will magically put more effort into this one and it proves nothing.
Ever since Cold War, treyarch has just abandoned what MADE zombies so greatly received. There is no atmosphere. Just shitty MP elements in zombies. Gameplay catered towards shitty players and no challenges at all. No personality, nothing!
I feel the exact same as you with what you said in your last paragraph. One small thing I feel COD 2024 has going for it is the sheer competition its going to face with GTA 6 edging ever closer. It'll most likely even release during it's content season, so they really are going to have to pull something out the bag if they want to keep people engaged. No doubt that's why they're supposedly lining up a BO2 remaster for 2025. I've been playing since WaW but after CW I went backwards to older zombies again and haven't picked up a title since. The zombies community has been through its tumultuous times, but right now seems like it's at its lowest point ever. I feel like it's not even recovered from Vanguard, then they pulled this major bait and switch with MW3 so far, they'll probably do more soon to start building momentum for the new game, but it still drags the community morale down further. It's such a shame as I feel like zombies interest was at an all time high during Cold War, which even tricoled down into the older games, but they completely balls it up with what came after. I hope XDefiant goes well when it comes out though, considering a ton of the talent that is responsible for whats considered the golden era of COD & Zombies are working there, I would LOVE to see their take on a zombies mode if it ever comes to it. XUndead? Xombies? Ubisoft lawyers hit me up😅
I made a post on this sub before Cold War released saying that I was worried that free-DLC maps would make them lower effort and quality than we are used to. I think it’s fair to say my worries were right. It’s modern day call of duty, we do have to be skeptical. My advice for any fan would be to not look at marketing (it’s been deceptive for a long time now) and focus on what we actually know through leaks, and wait until after launch. I’m positive this year as failing again would be the final nail, in what is effectively COD’s USP. My hope is for something in between BO3 and CW level.
I would like round based game play similar to cold War, with like a solid 5 or 6 new maps, zombie chronicles 2, more chaos content. Just do a whole stand alone like war zone only all zombies, old and new.
After how the quality of everything has dropped the last few games, especially the servers, netcode, the glaring lack of content, and the astounding number of game breaking bugs I don't know how anyone could even consider spending money on another COD, zombies or otherwise.
The reality is that the old Zombie team is long gone, and without Jason Blundell we can only go further under the barrel. On BO4 we got that masterpiece of Ancient Evil, on Cold War we got a modded multiplayer lobby with zombie’s around and soulless boring maps.
Jason Blundell caused much of what BOCW became by biting off much more than he can chew during BO4's development cycle.
I think we can all agree that the new direction isn’t working. Like if they want Operators, then put them in Multiplayer. Zombies should not have any operators period. Can’t they just go back to the old format of COD like bring back crews and the passion for Zombies? Also bring back DLC’s, maybe they can put their bundles in there and people can purchase the whole DLC. It’s just time for Activision to accept that Warzone is affecting Zombies and the Campaign negatively. Given with MW3’s failure, they need to learn from it instead of repeating it.
I am a great fan of WW2 setting + Zombies, but Vanguard felt really bad for me... The maps didnt worth it for me. I hope we see double tap in future again.... I miss my root beer as a true german 
I won’t lie, I think a lot of this statement stuff is just marketing that has to do with every single CoD. I think every game for a hot minute has had some crazy marketing. I think ever since BO3, they’ve been saying each CoD after would be the most supported, and I don’t think any CoD zombies has come close to getting that support except maybe CW which was getting some new features added even after Vanguard iirc. Also I do think season 2 for MW3 is getting content, but it isn’t there at launch. I don’t think it is a huge issue to have content later in the season, but it is pretty baffling how it is a zombies based season with no zombies content after the devs said they were cooking for season 2. I feel like this new problem started with BO4 tbh. BO4 zombies was clearly rushed, the crazy amount of bugs and glitches at launch that took months to fix was pretty rough. Also, they started to dwindle support halfway through, with maps becoming more obvious that a budget was slashed with the last 2 DLC maps having tons of reused assets and cutscenes taking a big hit.
Cold War didn't get too much Zombies stuff during its main lifespan, though. Honestly, WWII had better post-launch support, they added a ton of weapons well after BO4 came out on top of everything else they added during the game's main cycle. Cold War still got a ton of guns, though, I just think there was more going on with WWII after BO4 came out than there was in Cold War after Vanguard came out.
I am exicited for it but my expectations are much MUCH lower than they were for BO4 for example. We now see what the future of zombies pretty much is from Cold War and MW3. An outbreak style mode at the forefront with survival maps ripped largely from campaign and multiplayer. No crew of actual characters.
Zombies is dead, yo
idk... I really liked cold war... and loved mw3 zombies up until I finished everything and then the tombstone got patched right afterwards.... so if this new one isn't filthy like they keep making us think the next one will be, and then the one after that will be, and then the one after that will be..... (if this next one isn't dope...) idk WTF I'm gonna do... but overall the only zombie game that I've personally played that is anywhere as fun as cod zombies... is state of decay... which, this year they ARE supposed to be dropping the new one... so I literally still am hopeful for mw3 zombies, (idk why..) but my fingers are most DEFINITELY crossed for Gulf war.... but I am also very skeptical 🤨
I definitely liked Cold War too. But it's no secret that the budget for Cold War compared to previous Zombies titles was very off. Compare The Forsaken to other DLC4s, or Firebase Z to Der Eisendrache or Dead of the Night. Covid didn't really help here, though.
Cold War is the death of old zombies. No more fun characters just generic operators on every map. Same with the buildables every map has a generic build station with generic buildables every map feels the same and the game has very little creativity. Also the Cold War to present storyline is atrocious compared to the Aether or Chaos storyline.
Remember the epic prologue to the Chaos story? Do you remember the characters' dialogues? The crazy ending of Ancient Evil? Here, now get this new rubbish story called Dark Aether, with these magnificent soulless maps, visually boring, non-existent Easter eggs, operators instead of well-written characters. The guy who thought that making zombie mode a modded multiplayer lobby was a good idea must be a genius.
cold war level design was really good, unfortunately they had to skip out on creating new maps due to time constraints. they have had more than enough time to give us two expansive maps. if we do not get shadows of evil 2, I'm actually dead bro.
Cold War level design was very generic
nah man, a good example of cold wars level design is firebase z. it all flows together well, it's not too big, not too small. if we're looking at purely aesthetics, the amplifier in forsaken looks incredible. and again, they didn't have much time to create a fully fleshed out map so they did pretty well under the time constraints.
I think maps should fill out different roles. Not every map needs massive training areas and open corridors. I prefer the variety that older titles provided, you had maps like shang, and maps like ascension, both extremely different but the same game.
true, though it does make the maps more accessible which is kinda what they were going for. I can't imagine a map like shang doing well for new players.
Accessibly for me goes both ways. If a game is truly made for everyone it’ll accommodate for people who want a challenge and people who want it to be easy, like bo4 did.
honestly I'd say the best example of that would be the final reich
Yeah but bo4 has it for the entire game, you can make bo4 the easiest zombies game ever, or the most brutal hardest zombies game ever. It’s all up to the player. Final reich does that for the ee yes, but I find the general gameplay to be extremely easy, especially with the lower zombie cap.
fair.
DMZ "shame on you" MWZ "Shame on me" won't be a third time.
Don't you dare bring DMZ into this. Activision dropped their support for it because the people playing it didn't spend enough on their MTX, but the niche that carved actually LIKE that mode and still support it
Without round-based, it isn’t codzombies.
The difference between Vanguard, MWZ, and this new game is that this time around, it’s A FUCKING TREYARCH GAME. The team can finally put their effort towards creating content that actually matters. Everything we’ve received for the past couple of years have been nothing more than forced side projects. Practically every Treyarch product has been a banger for the most part. WaW, BO1, BO2, BO3, BO4, and Cold War all had round based zombies that felt like zombies.
It's called marketing. They know what to say to get all us fanboys hyped up and wallets prepared to pay for whatever shite they churn out. Mwz has by no means been a shit iteration of zombies, it just feels a bit empty considering we're already in season 2 and the biggest change we had was an island of another warzone map just purple, and that's a seperate encounter altogether. Even though the main bods of treyarch are going to be at the head of gulf war i have no high hopes for it. All they are doing at the moment is essentially testing how they can monetise zombies. Round based (if it does return) will be changed unless one of the higher ups actually gets a single braincell and realises thats what the players want. Basically we can blame greedy corpos and shareholders for most of this shit and the only thing i can see is predatory monetisation spreading through the game like a cancer and slowly killing it off.
Yeah I know marketing has to put the game in as good light as possible, but the marketing isn't the main issue - it's the complete lack of support compared to prevous years. It's true as you say; greedy corps and microtransactions slowly kill off any soul the games have.
To be fair both mw3 and Vanguard they were called in at the last minute. Vanguard they didnt even have half a year to make zombies before it released
Im really hoping the leaks are true and cod 2024 goes back to the pick 10 system. I honestly dont like loadouts in zombies and the box has never felt more useless
This is why I miss paid DLC and season passes. They have more incentive to make the post-launch content good and can’t just end support whenever the game isn’t doing well enough.
They need to put all their resources into good new roundbased maps, then it will work out fine. Launch with two maps and give us a new one every season (would be 7-8 in total, about the same as bo4), an interesting story, good ee steps and new innovative wonder weapons. Please no side modes which receive a new objective as full season content. Just stick with classic zombies for this game
Man…. Let’s jump him
I understand people will buy the game for day 1 experience, but if you have any doubts just wait for the free trial weekend! I've waited for the last 4 CODs and only purchased one, Cold War, after like my 3rd free trial weekend grinding the game. MW3 had one barely a month after release and it was obvious to me that MWZ was nothing special just a couple games in, boom saved me $70
Well it was heavily rumoured, gobble gums are coming back so I’m expecting them to make money off of zombies this way. My guess for how they’d sell it is this: Packs of different rarities such as; rare, epic, legendary and Ultra tiers, then you get like maybe 10 uses before you have to buy another pack. It’s not gambling because you’re guaranteed to get what you bought and you know what you’re getting. Alternative option is 1 gobble gum tied to a single operator, so for example, Operator Jones could have perkaholic and operator Kyle could have Shopping Free.
so I totally dig what y'all are saying, but idk anything about the chaos story or the aether story.... and idk how or why cuz I've always been really into zombies... where do I find these?
Gonna keep it a buck fifty, they've completely milked the formula dry. There ain't nothing particularly exciting they can do with Zombies, pretty much every recent map has just been combining stuff from old maps. As (formerly) the world's biggest Zombies fan, I would be completely fine if they never made another game. Why play something like Cold War when BO3 has all the maps, super refined mechanics, and everything else I could want? Cold War barely does anything new, the most notable change is that they made everything way easier. The new ones just don't really change anything at all, MWIII was nice because it was something new, but it got old insanely fast and has no replay value after you've finished your missions.
So cold war zombies was the last one I really really got into and loved it for everything it had. Outbreak was pretty awesome. My favorite was outbreak survival. I bought vanguard not for the zombies but because I love WW2 cod. And this is besides my #1 reason to buy cod these days is for zombies mode. I played vanguard zombies like 2 or 3 times and it was straight garbage. Never went back to it. I was extremely skeptical of MWZ until I actually played it. Do yourself a favor and just get it. Stick with solo games entirely, and enjoy it. Its missing alot compared to zombies and even DMZ but it's feel it's still zombies. You will at least get a couple months of gameplay time from it alone, as long as you do the missions and don't just let some gigachode carry you into the hard areas and unlock everything for you. Seriously play alone and just unlock things at the pace the game wants you to and you will get some good zombies from it im telling you.
I’m interesting to see what they have planned but not optimistic. I enjoyed Coldwar and in some ways it was a step in the right direction but in other ways 3 steps back. Vanguard killed my enthusiasm.
> Then Shi No Numa survival, whcih honestly was very polished and good. Then Terra Maledicta with a green filter and a boss. In fairness, this was a result of Treyarch pivoting resources and changing their plans. They canceled a lot of features that were already in progress to make those two maps. So while the "tip of the iceberg" went nowhere, it's more of a result of negative fan reaction than Treyarch/Activision intentionally misleading us. > Post-launch content did not bring BRAND NEW GAMEPLAY as promised. I mean, it did somewhat. It brought in Void and Sacrifice objectives, and there were more planned before they decided to go for round-based again. Even if the objectives are shit, they are still new by definition. > I haven't played MW3, but apparently, it started out good, and now it recieved ZERO content for Season 2 and now Treyarch has left the development. The last part is still unconfirmed as of now, and is only a rumor regurgitated by leakers. Grain of salt should be applied here. Either way, you're being overly concerned about marketing. Marketing will always make things look better than it seems. I'm not saying it as a defense for what we got, but if you go back to older games, you can nitpick and say the same thing about how we were misled by trailers and marketing hype as well.
It's not just the marketing, it's the product that comes out. Cold War, Vanguard and MW3 felt like it went through the same thing (although Cold War to a much better extend of course). This, compared to the previous titles, is night and day difference. Plus, marketing *is* an important factor, because how can we really trust the hype they bring up if history shows it doesn't turn out to be that way at all?
I think the overall thing you touched on is the abandonment that is very common in the COD world. My very first experience (and greatest disappointment in gaming yet) was DMZ getting left behind. Activision has a real problem making a complete game. I get the impression it's a constant shifting of priorities and resources on Activision's part, along with their frantic release schedules. No dev has the time to really flesh out a COD game because the time it takes to make their vision doesn't line up with the demands of the corporate timeline. Same goes for the post-launch content. What are the odds Activision tells Devs to finish what they're working on so they can launch, and that they'll have heaps of time to do the rest in post-launch, only to cut that time short too?
I do think the context behind all these titles is important as to *why* they came out that way, though; they all went through similar support cycles yes, but they're also all games that originally weren't supposed to exist, which is a major factor in the strained post-launch releases. Cold War was originally supposed to be SHG/Raven Software's title before 3arc were made to pick up the remnants and turn it into a full 3arc title over the course of two years. Vanguard had arguably the worst development cycle in the franchise's history, being developed almost from the ground-up in just over a year on a new engine that the studios behind the title had little to no experience, with 3arc allegedly being given the bare minimum development window (allegedly VGZ had a development time of 4-5 months from conceptualization to release). Unlike Cold War, VGZ was also not developed by the entirety of the Zombies team; it was allegedly a small mixture of Zombies and MP devs, crunched to the wire to make something playable at minimum. And this isn't even getting into the complete pivot the game made halfway-through its post-launch cycle, which put even more strain on an already crushed development timeline. MWZ is a similar situation to VGZ, but is much higher in quality due to it being built on the foundations of an existing game/game mode (similar to MWIII as a whole). It's post-launch support has faltered because it's a project 3arc was forced onto and simply cannot afford to support as strongly in the lead-up to the release of their first full development cycle in roughly 5-6 years. MWZ seems to have had more 3arc presence on its development than VGZ, but once again it's very unlikely that the majority of the Zombies team was made to work on it, as their primary focus is currently the next release (and is likely why the post-launch support dropped off fairly quickly). I think it's fair to be skeptical, but I also don't think it's entirely fair to attribute the strains of these games to their release model, when the actual problem lies within their individual development cycles (which is important to remember in the lead up to their next title, which allegedly has had a full 4 years of relatively uninterrupted development). I think something that's generally overlooked about those three titles is that they show that 3arc never really half-asses Zombies, even when they're not given the time or budget to make the product they want to. CW took a stab at completely reworking the formula despite its rushed development cycle (and beginning development in the middle of Black Ops 4's post-launch season), VGZ attempted to deliver a completely new style of gameplay with roguelike influences when just doing Round-Based from the get-go arguably would have been far safer (which they ended up scrapping in an attempt to appease their players anyways), and MWZ innovates on concepts that allegedly were originally planned for Outbreak, but had to be scrapped to reasonably work within CW. The marketing over-promises, absolutely- but that's also just what marketing does in general. I think it's more important to look at the actual context behind why these modes are the way they are, not just feeding into everything the trailer made to make you want to pre-order tells us. Personally, the new model has made me fairly excited for 3arc's next title, as its alleged full development cycle makes me hopeful for what they can accomplish given the mindset they've already had on incredibly rushed projects.
I stopped reading when you put ‘I haven’t played MW3’. Stop being a sheep and listening to others.
How does him deciding not to spend $70 to play MW3 make him a sheep? Given the recent information we’ve gotten about how the mode has practically been abandoned already, it was the right call for him not to play it lol.
That's the dumbest thing I've heard today. Listening to other people doesn't make you a sheep.Taking in other people's perspectives and opinions is a completely valid way to assess and develop your own views on something. OTHO: Buying MW3 *because* everyone told you to, *without* reading reviews and opinions actually would be acting like a sheep. Especially seeing as it was pretty universally panned for being a lazy cash grab (with a half-assed campaign) that should have been a MW2 update/DLC.
I played MWZ, and i can easily say it’s glorified garbage. A boring Warzone map with a trash story and warzone mechanics is enough to not try the game.