Due to sensational popularity, a massive esports scene, and many crazy kill clips, Call of Duty Warzone had a massive player base. The 150-player battle royal started on the previous generation consoles and it is time for it to retire. Fortunately for sweat-lords the world over, Activision has been prepared for the handoff to the new generation of Warzone with today’s release of Call of Duty: Warzone 2.0. If you weren’t aware, this new iteration features improvements from the original while sticking with the heavily successful formula of “stay alive till the end” battle-royal gameplay. Graphical improvements aside, this new version features AI-run strongholds, stronger vehicle usage, changes to how the game plays out, and a new map called Al-Mazrah. Oh, and proximity chat. Imagine the toxicity, and you’re probably right!
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 players will understand the significance of it right away, but Al-Mazrah is a large map that actually features some of the multiplayer maps as areas in the large world, full of loot and enemies. Solo or in up to a four-person squad, players must survive ever-tightening rings of smoke/radiation to be the last players alive who manage to escape and win. Dropping into the map from the sky with only a pistol, players will have to scavenge for weapons or buy loadouts by doing missions or killing other players, and in a game with 150 players, this can be quite a challenge.
Interestingly, Warzone 2.0 releases featuring a much-talked-about game mode, DMZ. This extraction-based mode will have players entering the same map as the battle royal, but this time they are bringing in their own weapons and gear. As they play through the game, with up to 66 players but many AI enemies, each three-player team will do missions and pick up keys and gear. Whatever players manage to safely extract will be kept, but if they die instead of extracting they lose everything they came in with. While similar to battle-royal, this mode is loosely based on extraction shooters like Escape From Tarkov and The Cycle: Frontier but feels much more casual and arcadey than either of these games. Only time will tell how players take to this new mode.
Call of Duty: Warzone 2.0 is out now on PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, and PC. Check out the launch trailer below and let us know your thoughts in the comments!
