Wednesday in the U.S., was an exciting day for Call of Duty fans all over the globe. Activision, Infinity Ward, and Microsoft teamed up to unveil Call of Duty Ghosts, particularly the multiplayer parts of the game. Multiplayer action has been a driving staple of the COD franchise, driving it to levels of popularity previously unattainable by any video game. Activision CEO made note of this, thanking the fans, and promising that boundaries will continue to be tested, limits pushes, and expectations exceeded.
Call of Duty Ghosts takes place in the near future, 10 years after the United States has fallen. Players take on the role of members of an super covert, elite force known as Ghosts. New additions to the game include:
New Movement: Lean, Knee Slide, and Mantling
Riley: a fearless German Shepard that can sniff out bombs and attack nearby enemies and even growls when enemies are nearby, granting UAV like benefits
Dynamic Events on Multiplayer Maps: Events that change the layout of the map such as floods and earthquakes
Deeper character customization than ever before: 20,000 ways to customize the unique look for your character and squad members.
Several New Coop Modes including Squads
30 new weapons
One new weapon class
7 new game modes
20 new Killstreaks including: Helo scout, Vulture, and Juggernaut
Mark Rubin, executive produce for Infinity Ward stated that the development process has been both innovative and organic. He stated that when it came to coming up with tweaks and improvements for the game, it didn’t matter how cool of an idea it was. “If it didn’t make it better, it’s out.” Nothing was sacred.
Character customization is a big part of COD Ghosts. It was confirmed that there are at least 20,000 unique combinations to help customize the character. This includes their body type, face, hair, camouflage, and gear. Ghosts will also provide the first opportunity to play a female soldier in the Call of Duty franchise. The customization is not all just cosmetic either. Here, you are creating a soldier, not just a class.
Players are allocated a budget for primary, secondary and tactical weapons as well as perks. For perks, there will be an allowance of 8 points. Players could choose to upload perks in any order they want so long as it doesn’t go over the point limit. So, you could load up four 3 point perks. You could also load up eight 1 point perks. Or, maybe four 1 point perks and two 2 point perks. You can also get rid of secondary and tactical weapon selections to equip your soldier with up to 11 perks total. Of course, this new rendition of Call of Duty also includes more perks than ever before.
As mentioned, there are already 30 new weapons being added, and that’s not including the upcoming DLC. There is also a new weapon class. The Marksman Rifle acts as both a semi-automatic rifle and traditional, iron sight single-shot rifles. This is perhaps one of the most difficult weapons types to master in the game, but is also one of the most rewarding.
The addition of dual render scopes means that players can zoom in on a target, but also maintain their peripheral vision.
There will be assault, support, and strike packages in the new Call of Duty. There will be a reduced number of air-based package rewards and an increased number of ground-based ones. The packages will have their lethality toned down while offering better rewards for the achieving players. One more note: No more death streaks!
New movement controls allow characters to lean, leaning around walls and other obstacles with a simple button push to take shots and duck back behind cover. The mantling movement allows players to jump over objects without losing momentum. The kneeslide allows players to go from a run to a kneeling or prone position. All of these new movement controls allow players to keep momentum going during the game, which is very important.
Squad Play
A totally new addition to Call of Duty Ghosts is the Squad play. Players createup to 10 soldiers and each of those soldiers gains prestige, for a total of 10 prestige. These are squad members and many of the new game play modes revolved around the squads. Squad play can include single player against a highly evolved AI, co-op, and multiplayer. Squad members will be controlled by AI as a part of your team, played how they are customized. So, a squad member outfitted with a sniper rifle will be played like a sniper by the AI. Whatever mode you choose to play Squads in, you will earn multiplayer XP.
The game will include seven new modes including Cranked—a mode where you speed up and gain perks after earning a kill, but you end up exploding if you don’t kill again within 30 seconds. Search and Rescue is based on Search and Destroy. In Search and Rescue, players drop dog tags when they die. Team members can pick up the dog tags and revive their fallen comrades. If enemies grab the dog tags, that’s it, they’re out.
Squads will play as one-on-one as each member leading their own squad against one another. Wargame allows players to pick 5 squad members and battle it out against 5 AI controlled squad members. Squad assault allows players to challenge offline squad members, award XP to both. The offline squad will gain XP depending on how well they do, so your load outs and gear are important even when you are not online, playing the game.
New multiplayers maps bring in dynamic environments. These allow players to interact with the maps in a way they have never been able to before. You can effectively trap other players and change the map as play goes on. The map shifts. The Octane Map, for example, allows players to blow up a gas station to take out other players and create cover or blow up a wall to create a sniper’s perch.
Call of Duty Ghosts is set to release on Xbox 360, PS3, Wii U, and PC. It will also be released on Xbox One and PS4 when those systems release. The new game takes advantage of several next generation technologies. As an added benefit, current generation consoles will be able to benefit from many of these upgrades. Furthermore, with the updates to the software, Call of Duty players will be able to quickly and easily transfer data from current generation systems to next gen systems of the same family. So, Xbox 360 data can be transferred to an Xbox One and PS3 to PS4, but not a PS3 to Xbox One.
60 fps on all system
New Audio
Best graphics
With the audio, players will be privy to location based battle chatter, ADSR based reverb and reactive emitters. This means players can easily call out enemy targets near landmarks. The sounds will changes as the environment changes so gunshots in a hollow metal container will sound very different than gunshots in a carpeted room. This means you will know when someone is in your space. Also, when you do something like throw a grenade, the explosive force may cause something to react behind you or around a corner, providing a more immersive game.
New Mobile App Features
New Meta Game Clan Wars
Push Load Outs to the Game before next match or even during a game with second screen technology
Touch-based Emblem Editor
You will be able to level up your clan with any multiplayer match you play. You can also go to an exclusive clan based game, pitting your clan against another. Clan benefits include more load outs and benefits than ever before. Clan Wars pits clans on near equal ratings against one another every two weeks as they battle for parts of a map. The longer a clan controls the maps, the higher the points and better the benefits are. However, once a clan controls a piece of the map, that means it is them against all over clans on the map. Special clan only benefits added for Ghosts include special emblems, gunsights, and even cameras.
This was spoken about primarily along with the new mobile app developed for Call of Duty Ghosts. It was not clear whether users would need the mobile app to move their profile data between systems or not. Meanwhile, there are several new features of the mobile app. Everyone who has already signed up for Call of Duty Elite—some 20 million players—will already have an account. It will include familiar features including keeping track of rankings, KDR, outfitting characters and pushing the load outs directly to the game.
E-Sports will continue to be a big part of Call of Duty, or rather COD Ghosts will be a big part of e-sports. As the challenge resumes in 2014 from Xbox Ghsots will be the exclusive FPS at the championship. There is more news forthcoming on this.
Those who pre-order Call of Duty Ghosts will receive access to the exclusive Freefall map. In Freefall, characters are dropped onto a skyscraper preparing to collapse. Also, there is a new season pass for four DLC patches planned on being released for COD Ghosts. For those who pre-order the Season Pass, an exclusive Ghost leader character will be included. There is the limited edition and prestige edition for COD Ghosts. The boxes both include metal cases and paracord bracelets. The prestige edition includes a 1080i HD helm cam. The limited Hardened Edition and Prestige Edition Call of Duty Ghosts will include the Season pass as well. Also, when you purchase your copies of Call of Duty Ghosts November 5th, 2013, be sure to purchase the limited edition dog tags to help to support the Call of Duty Endowment, a non-profit initiative to put returned veterans back to work.
Call of Duty: Ghosts Multiplayer Reveal is posted on Call of Duty Community