An ex-Call of Duty developer has shed new light on a canceled Raven Software live-service Zombies project, detailing what the game would have been and how it would have played.
In an interview with YouTuber Glitching Queen (thanks, Rock Paper Shotgun), ex-Raven Software designer and project lead Michael Gummelt, who's now with ZeniMax, talks about the canceled project.
Glitching Queen shows a document on-screen that she says was sent to her by Gummelt, and it describes what the canceled game, which was codenamed Project Zed, would have consisted of.
According to the document shared by Gummelt, the game would have been "microtransaction-based" and would have been "an expansion and evolution" of the Zombies mode that has appeared in Call of Duty games since 2008's World at War.
The game would have been a digital download rather than a boxed product, and it wouldn't have been sold for full price. Additionally, it would have featured a "fun, campy, and experimental" tone and would have been aimed away from exclusively targeting hardcore gamers.
In the interview with Glitching Queen, Gummelt elaborates that the mode would have involved a Mad Max-style arena in which players were thrust in order to fight zombies. Eventually, players would "escape out into [an] open world".
Characters were customizable, which is where the microtransactions would have come in; Gummelt's comments in the interview make microtransactions in the canceled project sound mostly cosmetic. You can check the interview out here; the relevant section starts at around 12:30.
Gummelt was working on this project between November 2011 and June 2012 according to his LinkedIn page, and it's easy to see how folks might have been excited to play something like what he's describing back then.
The landscape today looks a little different; the failure of games like Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, as well as the cancellation of titles like Hyenas, arguably speaks to a gaming public much more hostile towards live-service games than it once was.
I can only speak for myself, but honestly, the prospect of playing a live-service Call of Duty: Zombies game fills me with dread, and not in the good way. It's a shame Gummelt and company didn't get to realize their dreams, but I'm honestly glad I didn't have to see them come to fruition as well.
