Modern Warfare Multiplayer Hands-on Preview

Author
Ned Jordan
Date
8/1/2019
In Short
A first look at Call of Duty: Modern Warfare's multiplayer design, modes, and gameplay.

At an event in Los Angeles this week, Infinity Ward gave members of the press a first look at Modern Warfare’s multiplayer gameplay. Before letting us loose on the game, we were given an extensive look at what the studio wanted to do with Modern Warfare’s multiplayer mode and how that drove its design and led to final form of the game we were about to play.

The first to speak was Pat Kelly, Studio Head of Infinity Ward. He began by laying out the principles behind the game that they used to drive its design. These principles were viewed with such importance by the team that they called them their Modern Warfare Dogma, the religion that they wanted to make their game by.

The first of these is “gameplay is king”. They didn’t want to get hung up on effects or cinematics, everything they did had to serve the gameplay experience.

The next is “authentic and gritty”. Does everything added to the game feel real and authentic? Does the experience feel like it has been ripped from the headlines? The game should not be about superheroes, but real soldiers using real guns and it should deliver a real experience.


Authentic and Gritty
Authentic and Gritty

Third is “unified experience”. People currently identify themselves as campaign gamers or multiplayer gamers, and Infinity Ward wants to make them all Modern Warfare players. All progression, guns, and equipment are common across all game modes – anything you unlock in one mode will be available in all other modes. The guns must also feel the same in all modes, so if you get used to a weapon while playing the campaign, then it should behave in the same way when you use it in multiplayer.

The fourth principle is “state of the art”. Modern Warfare should establish a high water mark for games. It should invoke some of the same feelings that people had when they first played games like DOOM or Grand Theft Auto – a memorable experience.

Next, the game must be “badass fun”. The explosions, guns, weapon feel, and everything else should be badass and fun to use.

Lastly, there is the principle of “bringing players together.” No one should be prevented from playing Modern Warfare with their friends because they own different platforms or don’t subscribe to the season pass. Modern Warfare will be cross play compatible, bringing PC, PS4, and Xbox One gamers together in a Call of Duty game for the first time. And no one will be locked out of a match because they don’t own the right map – there will be no Modern Warfare season pass, and all post-launch content will be released for free. The game’s beta will also be open to all when it launches in September.

With that the mic was handed over to Geoff Smith, MP Design Director. Smith worked on the map design in previous Modern Warfare games, but he didn’t just want to recreate the old maps. There are plenty of fans of the old maps, but the faster gameplay of modern shooters has its fans as well, so Smith took the approach that Modern Warfare should be a whole new game and move away from the preconceived notions of what a Call of Duty game is. The team stripped down the games in the series and looked at every feature, deciding which should be carried into Modern Warfare. Doing so allowed them to use what worked in the past without making Modern Warfare a simple reboot.


Multiplayer screenshot
Multiplayer screenshot

Joe Cecot, MP Design Director, spoke next, detailing the MP team’s design principles. First they wanted to add more strategy and tactics to the game. They wanted to expand the tactical choices available to players, and give them more opportunities to decide when to engage and when to disengage as well.

Next they wanted to accommodate all play styles, so players could run-and-gun, play as a sniper, or discover new play styles not seen before.

They also strove to deliver best-in-class down-the-barrel gameplay. The weapons needed to feel both real and powerful. The team fired actual guns to research how the weapons handled, and then went back to the studio to tear down the old Call of Duty weapons system and build a new one from the ground up.

The next principle was exploration and discovery. They wanted to create maps that were playgrounds, fill them with toys, and then let the players be free to play with things in different ways. Reaching spaces on the map should be puzzles with solutions, but the players should have the leeway to discover new things that the designers didn’t anticipate. This leads directly into their goal to provide more depth and replayability to every firefight.

Lastly they wanted everything to be both fresh and familiar, challenging the thinking of what a Modern Warfare is, but also protecting the feeling of nostalgia players have for Modern Warfare games.

After the team explained what drove the game’s MP design, they began to reveal that design, beginning with Joel Emslie, Studio Art Director. He said that the team looked at modern real world engagements, and they came down to large and small engagements, each of which had their own unique characteristics. This led them to create three map classes.

The first are the 2v2 Flash Maps, which are designed to represent a training facility. These are small, confined maps in which players will be able to see each other from one side to the other. The second class is the Tactical Maps which support 6v6 games. These maps represent the bread and butter of Special Forces missions: small-scale tactical engagements. The final category is the large player count Battle Maps, which are the open playgrounds for large-scale fights. In designing all of the maps, the team wanted to deemphasize the three-lane design paradigm and create maps with power positions. This mimics real-world battles in which military units look for the best firing and most defensible positions. These power positions in a way add an objective to the modes that don’t have map objectives such as Team Deathmatch.


Modern Warfare multiplayer screen
Modern Warfare multiplayer screen

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The team also wanted to “take the plastic off of the furniture” by allowing players to climb on almost anything on the maps. The increased traversal options will force players to think dimensionally in all three dimensions because players can move across the map or enter buildings in a number of ways.

Another way in which the new maps will increase tactical choice is through the addition of working doors. There are a number of ways to open doors, so you won’t be locked into a space while you’re waiting for a door to slowly swing open. You can partially open a door and peek through or toss in a grenade, push them open normally, use melee to kick them open, or force them open with explosive damage, for example by cooking a grenade and leaving it at the door.

If you’re on the other side of the door, you can listen for a telltale squeak when they are opened slowly or a loud crash if a player comes barreling through it. You’ll have another advantage if an enemy does bash a door down behind you, because the force of breaking through the door causes camera shake and gun sway for the breaching player.


A Call of Duty door
A Call of Duty door

There are other new ways to interact with the environment. Every weapon has a realistic caliber and muzzle velocity, and these affect bullet penetration which will allow you to shoot players through cover if you have the right weapon at the right range to penetrate its material. To facilitate this the game actually models every bullet fired during gameplay.

New mount mechanics will allow you to mount weapons to both horizontal and vertical positions, allowing players to mount a weapon on the corner of a building.

Night vision in multiplayer is a new feature introduced in Modern Warfare, but the team didn’t want to simply add a gimmick to the game so they went deep on researching night vision as used by Special Forces teams. The Special Forces operatives taught the team about laser discipline. It is now common for their enemies to possess night vision technology, so the infrared lasers they use can give away their positions. They must be disciplined to use the laser when it is needed, an element of night combat the team brought into the game by allowing enemies using night vision to see your laser when you aim down your sights. Other elements of night vision combat were also brought into the game. The goggles are too big to allow you to bring your weapon up to your cheek when aiming down the sights, and this is modeled in the game by the position of your weapon when aiming down sights while wearing goggles. Lights can overwhelm night vision, so muzzle flashes and lights can blur your vision. You can even blind your opponents by flipping a switch and turning the lights on in a room.

Modern Warfare will use kill streaks instead of score streaks. The idea behind this is that it encourages players to be more tactical by motivating them to want to actively protect their life. Kill streak rewards will be a mix of old and new. For example, Juggernaut returns while a co-op reward of a tank with a gunner position is new. Some of the new rewards will require line-of-sight targeting, reducing the number of rewards that can be used by a player hiding at the back of a map.


Kill streak rewards
Kill streak rewards

The team next revealed the new gunsmith system. They wanted the gun bench to be a hero in the game, so they made it feel as realistic and tangible as possible. They built an actual gun table in their studio with the help of Special Forces operatives to make sure that they got it right. You’ll see your weapon and attachments on the table, and even your perks will be represented.

There are 30 to 60 attachments per weapon, so you have the freedom to try different combinations - put a sniper scope on an M4 and you’ve made it a DMR. Since you need to deal with battles on small and large scales, these kinds of hybrid builds can be critical. The situations that you face in battle are like the puzzles that your hybrid builds will solve.

The game will feature two factions in multiplayer, the Coalition and the Allegiance, which are roughly divided along West vs. East lines. You’ll be able to select an operator for both factions, but your selection is purely cosmetic. You can further customize the operatives with gear, executions, and voice packs that you’ll unlock as you progress.

The presentation then turned its attention to the game’s presentation, as Mark Grigsby, Animation Director, and Stephen Miller, Audio Director, took the stage. In looking to create a more realistic look to the weapons in the game, they first looked at creating active idle animations, and then moved to walk, jog, sprint, and tactical sprint, because in each case the weapon is held in a different position. This change isn’t just aesthetic – since you run with your weapon away from your body it will take longer to aim down your sights after coming out of a full sprint. They also worked on the reload animations so that a tactical reload will look different than a full reload. With a tactical reload your gun will stay sighted, you’ll see bullets still in the clip that you’re removing, and then you’ll see the clip being moved to your belt to be available to be used again. Weapons will vent gasses and smoke when fired, just as their real-life counterparts do.


Real-life weapons
Real-life weapons

Since the weapons are the stars of the game, the development team wanted to give them their own voice. Of the 90 channels of audio in the game, 20 have been dedicated to the weapons. The mechanics and components of each weapon have their own audio character, and you’ll even hear the click of a disconnector when you release the trigger. The weapon will sound slightly different when fired from the hip than it does in ADS, and you’ll hear each bullet casing hit the ground after it is ejected and that sound will depend on the surface the casing lands on. Atmospheric sound is contextual based on the environment. Fire a weapon over an open area and you’ll hear the echo reverberate off of the mountains as it travels into the distance. Fire it indoors and the sound will be different. The speed of sound has been added to the game, so you’ll see the flash of distant explosions before you hear the blast. And if you’re closer to the blast, you’ll hear the shrapnel hit objects and the sounds it makes will depend on the surfaces it hits. With that, the presentation ended and we were able to take our stations and get some hands-on time with the game.

The first games we played were on the Tactical Maps, both in TDM and Domination. When I was waiting for the start of the first match I looked around the screen and was impressed with how realistic the graphics looked, and then my eyes noticed the watch on my character. It was showing the current time, and it kept accurate time throughout the match. How cool is that? When the first match started the immediate difference I noticed from previous games was that there was no radar. When enemies fire or are spotted you’ll see a marker on the compass at the top of the screen which will give you general direction and range, but you won’t have the pinpoint placement you do with radar (radar is still in the game, but as a temporary perk bonus). As I began to move around the map I tried out the game’s traversal mechanic and found that you really can climb just about anything and that the implementation is so smooth that you can use it by reflex without even thinking about it. It was strange at first to be opening doors in a Call of Duty game, but that too soon became a part of the way I traversed the map. It also added another element of caution to the game, as I wondered who could be hiding behind a closed door or if an open door meant that an enemy had just passed through. I also got into the habit of closing doors behind me, both to protect my rear and so that I wouldn’t let the air-conditioning out. The gameplay felt more tactical and less focused on speed, and finding good, protected firing positions more important than running headlong into the fight.

Here’s gameplay capture from a Domination match played on the Gun Runner map, an industrial zone bisected by a rail line. This map provides for a variety of close-quarters engagements, along with some dangerous open areas that must be crossed to reach the next capture point.

I also had the chance to play on the Azhir Cave map which features clusters of small buildings linked by a large cavern in the middle. The cavern has multiple entry points, and since it was the most direct way to traverse the map it became the focal point of a lot of the action. Here’s capture from a TDM match played on that map.

We were also given the chance to play on Azhir Cave in a night mode version, which completely changed the character of the game. You really do become a lot more cautious and reluctant to bring your weapon to sights knowing that the enemy will see your laser and then can home in on your position. You can see for yourself that gameplay completely changes at night, even on the same map.

We next played Gunfight on a couple of the Flash Maps, which were fast-paced matches played on really small maps. Each round is played until one team of two is eliminated, with a point going to the winning team. To prevent players from hiding from each other the whole time the matches are timed. When time expires the first team to capture the flag in the middle of the map wins. Adding to the challenge is that your weapons load-out is chosen at random and changes every two rounds. You’ll need to use different tactics for a round with pistols than one with sniper rifles.

As you can see, rounds can be won at close range:

Or from all the way across the map:

The final matches were TDM played on the Aniyah Palace map. Aniyah Palace is a Battle Map and it is indeed large. The palace sits in the middle of the map and represents one of those power points the developers discussed. The area around the palace is a mix of clusters of buildings and large open spaces. The map is so large that it can be disorienting at first, and it will take you a little time to become familiar with its layout. The palace served as a magnet for players in the matches that I played, and battles became tug-of-wars to capture the palace and then hold it against the inevitable counter-assault. The mix of needing to cross open space to reach the palace and the close quarters fighting required to take it seemed to be one of those puzzles that needs a hybrid gun solution that the developers were talking about.

I enjoyed playing Modern Warfare’s MP mode, and look forward to learning about all of the other maps and modes it will offer. The gameplay feels decidedly different than that of the last few Call of Duty games, and it will undoubtedly be attractive to those looking for a more tactical experience and less twitch-based play. It does preserve the Call of Duty core, though, so players who have played the previous few games will probably welcome the change of pace and the new challenges it brings. The event started with the developers sharing their goals for the game with us, and in the few hours I had with the game it looks like they put a lot of work into the multiplayer mode to meet those goals.


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Transmitted: 2/13/2025 6:42:51 PM