Report: Four more Infinity Ward employees leave studio

Like Rats from a sinking ship. What happens, if "everyone" leaves?

Nothing, if everyone leaves then Activision will just fill IW with new devs, the IW name will be enough to gross a couple more million when cod 8 rolls around.

Stoop Kid is also entirely correct.

People will stop buying Call of Duty games eventually (just because it'll get to the point where Activision have milked it dry) but as for this incident, IW will go on even marginally "successful" just because of the name.

The majority of gamers most likely have no idea of these problems with IW and Activision, or even care.

but who would want to work for a company after all this? I wouldn't want to work for actavision after they just screwed a bunch of their employees.

If everyone left IW, I'd imagine (as the ultimate kick-to-the-balls to ex-IW employees) that they'd just rename Treyarch as Infinity Ward. Then Treyarch could just keep pumping out sequels, and most people that buy the COD games would assume that Treyarch stopped making the COD games and they'd have no idea what ever happened.

"People will stop buying Call of Duty games eventually (just because it'll get to the point where Activision have milked it dry)"


I think we've reached and subsequently crossed that bridge.

eff that I'd work for activision. a job's a job. It's probably not perfect but I'm sure my current jobs are much worse.

It did it's job

But with all that money,

Activision = IDDQD.

You're partially right, but what happens if Treyarch or Sledgehammer screws one up?

@Dr. 32x: hasn't Treyarch been screwing up their releases of Call of Duty for awhile now? I haven't been impressed.

I know I'm a minority here but I've only purchased MW and MW2 (I won WaW as a prize but enjoyed it and never played the first 3) and I can tell ya I won't be purchasing any more CoD's now after hearing whats happening to the developer's.

Which might be a good thing for my wallet

@Penguin

Difference is, most people knew to only buy CoD every other year. Now that won't work, and since Treyarch can't mooch off of IW...

Call of Duty 3 sucked..
Besides, look at Guitar Hero.. a lot of folk would probably say GH2 was the best one, and think the Rock Band people are just copycats.. a lot of people aren't in the know - they probably just think CoD is made by Activision themselves

A lot of you who keep saying, "Activision will make money regardless of who makes Call Of Duty, blah blah blah ..."

You're forgetting that buzz/word-of-mouth/Metacritic scores are what have made IW's COD games popular ... and what gets the masses you speak for buying a game.

When that positive domino effect starts tipping the other direction, no, you won't see Call Of Duty selling any more than any other lackluster FPS shooter franchise.

The only question is, how many releases will it take for this to happen. 2-3? 1?

I never played Call of Duty 3, so I can't say anything about that.

What I do know is World at War was a very good game, with fun multiplayer, and a popular little mode called Nazi Zombies. Say what you want about Treyarch, it was definitely good enough to deserve the Call of Duty name, and still sold about 10 million copies on the PS3 and 360.

We know Treyarch can release a good Call of Duty game, already, and while Sledgehammer still has to prove themselves, after all this stuff that has gone down, I seriously doubt Activision is going to let either of these studios release a sub-par Call of Duty game. We know Activision loves their money, and they have too much to lose not to bust their asses making sure the quality control is there.

Call of Duty WILL continue to sell.

Chances are, it's going to be at LEAST 2 years before we see anything released by these Respawn Studio guys, and we're probably looking at 3 or 4 years, since they still need to establish the studio.

What else is there until they release whatever it is they decide to do?

Medal of Honor?

Ghost Recon?

But without someone to build the engine and give them everything...

Metacritic scores?

How many Call of Duty fans do you think even know about Metacritic?

"Hey yo, dog. You get that new Call of Duty?"

"Nah, man. I heard that bitches Metacritic score was only an 87. I ain't wastin' my time with that noise."

"Word up, let's go play some Mass Effect 2. It's sitting at a 96 Meta-score."

Come on. =P

It hinges largely on the court case. If Activision doesn't get the Modern Warfare name, they're screwed.

penguin, WaW was a great game. pretty decent single player, fun multiplayer, campaign co-op which was a first for the series and pretty decent, and the fantastic nazi zombies mode. and the multiplayer added some great features to the series like squads and actual rewards for prestige.

I think it's safe to say you're oversimplifying what it takes to make a best-selling game.

Infinity Ward created the experience that led to Call Of Duty being what it is. Yes, others can milk that name and put out iterations of the Call Of Duty experience.

But the demands of gamers grow exponentially from year to year / release to release. If Activision's remaining dev studios are creating linear-incremental improvements, they will fall behind the "cool game" curve pretty quickly.

Taking the cynical approach--gamers are pretty dumb, etc.--can work in the short-term. But I'd like to see you guys come back to the site after COD has turned into an expected FPS clone, and tell us how much Activision is laughing. ;)

World at War will be my first and last Treyarch game I ever buy. MW2 will be my third (Fourth if you count MW2 hardened's CoD: Classic) and last CoD game I ever buy. Heres hoping MoH is good.

Good Lord these IW fanboys just can't let CoD3 go, can they? W@W was a great game... and two of the features that made it great, 4-player co-op campaign and Nazi Zombies, IW had jack shit to do with. Seriously, if they can't crank out an engine of their own they can just license the latest Unreal engine or something like most other devs do.

I'm thinking Mr. ESC is right though, until they create an original IP these jerk offs are never going let them shake the CoD3 stigma... and FWIW, CoD3 wasn't nearly as bad as it's made out to be. It was average, sure, but we're not talking some crap like Legendary here. It just had the unfortunate fate of being followed up by MW, which was excellent.

Not an IW fanboy--simply giving credit where credit is due.

WaW was a game based off the IW Call of Duty engine. That's a fact--not fanboyism. The 60/fps engine that IW created is the star of the COD experience, so it's hard to give Treyarch a lot if credit for adapting it to the WW2 setting.

The Treyarch maps were nice looking, for sure. They did a nice job of porting COD4 to WW2. But a nice job doesn't prove that Treyarch can innovate as a lead dev for the series. Not fanboyism--just a reasonable fact.

And as for Nazi Zombies--this feature came out of the zombie craze and was not an innovation, although it was novel for COD.

At the same time, Nazi Zombies broke the COD model by being purposely cheesy and outside the scope of realism which the COD franchise has excelled at. The over the top VO saying "Double pointsssss!!!" was a tone that lowered the game to a B-grade title. No doubt, B-grade titles are fun to play but they don't add anything new to gaming. The NZ mode added something new to COD, buy that's hardly the same as innovating in the FPS space--which IW has done.

Put it this way--if you're not an Infinity Ward fanboy, why are you playing Call Of Duty? Guess you'll find out what they brought to thr table cause it's on Treyarch's shoulders now. Can't wait for Viet Cong Zombie mode.

(And since their rumored Viet Nam-era game will undoubtedly use the Modern Warfare 2 engine, it will probably do as well as the coattail-riding WaW did).

Guess Respawn's first game and Treyarch's first COD on their own should be a good evaluation of their abilities. Too bad Treyarch will be on a 2 year cycle, though, as forced by Activision. Respawn's may take 3.

Hey, I no where was I trying to take credit away from IW. Yes, they created the engine. But it's also a fact that there are plenty of other engines available out there. Many great games are use engines created by other companies. So even if TA can no longer use IW's engines, that really doesn't mean much of anything at this point.


"The Treyarch maps were nice looking, for sure. They did a nice job of porting COD4 to WW2. But a nice job doesn't prove that Treyarch can innovate as a lead dev for the series. Not fanboyism--just a reasonable fact."

BS. That's no sort of "fact". In your whole reply you just conveniently left out my point about 4-player co-op. Did you ever even play that? It was fantastic, especially with the competitive score enabled. How is implementing the only use of co-op in CoD and doing it very successfully not being an innovative dev for the series? IW just used some lame excuse about narrative as the reason they didn't include campaign co-op. Which is amusing in hindsight considering the story is one of the most common gripes about MW2.

"At the same time, Nazi Zombies broke the COD model by being purposely cheesy and outside the scope of realism which the COD franchise has excelled at. The over the top VO saying "Double pointsssss!!!" was a tone that lowered the game to a B-grade title."

Oh please... more BS. It's a simple multiplayer mode outside the scope of the single player campaign. It's absurd to argue that that somehow lowers the whole game to B-grade level, especially considering how popular the mode was with players. I mean, really, I may as well argue that being called all kinds of names during a competitive MP session of MW2 lowers the game's "seriousness".

"Put it this way--if you're not an Infinity Ward fanboy, why are you playing Call Of Duty? Guess you'll find out what they brought to thr table cause it's on Treyarch's shoulders now. Can't wait for Viet Cong Zombie mode."

I play the games because I enjoy them. But I'm sick of Trey Arch getting dragged through the mud for no reason. They more than proved their worth with W@W.

This whole situation is so amusing anyway. Just before MW2 launched the general tone toward IW was VERY negative. People were hating on them for not including dedicated servers for the PC version. Then right after it launched people were complaining about the story and all the cheats and hacking going in MP (which, BTW, the TA games never had the same level of issues). Sure, most people still went out and bought the game, but complaints were everywhere and numerous. Then this whole issue with Activision happened and suddenly everyone shifted back to IW's side and along with that the TA bashing started up again.

Vidikron, you...are my hero.

Seriously, everything he said was true.I'm tired of all the hate for Treyarch.

Vidikron

The points you make in favor of Treyarch are fair. However I think you underestimate the importance of the engine of COD. It isn't just a matter of buying something from someone in the absence of IW's innovation. The only 2 excellent engines for FPS are made by Bungie and IW-- and it's no coincidence that their 2 games are always 1-2 on the most played chsrts for XBL.

I owned WaW and no, 4-player co-op is not a game innovation. It was a feature. And yes, Treyarch did a nice job (there's nice again) of taking someone else's idea--this time Bungie's--and bringing campaign scoring for 4-players to COD. Too bad the AI grenade spam made reviving teammates a huge chore, but the feature was appreciated.

Nazi Zombies was popular with my 12-year old nephew, and I'm sure a lot of other people. I found it cheesy. A lot of COD4 players I knew would not play the mode, even though they bought WaW. It is being heralded as an innovation, but again it was not an original idea.

IW is not without its faults. Everything you pointed out about their dumb decisions is true. But until you work in a creative media job--and see what takes to bring real innovations to the market, like IW and Bungie and EPIC have with their franchises--you're liable to think features are innovations. All this "jerk off" is saying is, there's a difference, and there's a reason IW created such a huge success, and it wasn't simply because they showed up to work or were handed something. They created it, and to the point of this OP, their absence will create a void in the COD franchise. After the MW2 engine that IW created goes stale, Acrivision and it's remaining devs will literally be starting over. Good luck to 'em.

@Vidikron

Remember how Medal of Honor was cool for a while but it rested on its laurels and got lazy and the quality started slowly slipping? I really feel that's what's going to happen with Call of Duty if Treyarch is at the helm. Oh, and there is something else to play; it's called (wait for it)...

BAD COMPANY 2

...and it's better than any CoD game imo. Plus, there's this little game called Reach coming out.

Activision is going all Plaxico Burress right now.

I think you still really underestimate Trey Arch. Calling co-op a nice feature or an innovation is really irrelevant (BTW, co-op is hardly Bungie's idea). Implementing it and doing it well is not an easy task. But Trey Arch pulled it off nicely while IW just gave excuses.

As for the engine, I'm not saying it's unimportant, I just think that is issue is sort of up in the air. I also think you're reaching a bit to claim those are the only two excellent engines. Companies like Epic and iD license their engines and I believe Crytek will be licensing their new engine as well. Or maybe Trey Arch will take a crack at making another engine themselves? Who knows? That's why I think it's a hard argument to make either way.

Again, I'm just sick of TA getting dragged through the mud anytime CoD is brought up. It's ridiculous and tired at this point. W@W was a very good game that not only implemented popular features that IW had nothing to do with, it also had fewer MP bugs and the IW games. I'm just get tired of IW fanboys refusing to acknowledge the work TA did with W@W. They either claim it's a terrible game or claim they owe it all to IW. Neither of which is true.

I do think losing IW will be detrimental to the series, how could it not be? But I also don't think it means that the TA games will automatically be crap. Given W@W I'm going to give them the benefit of the doubt until proven otherwise... or until Activision kills them too.

@Chilly P

Hey, could be. I'm not saying Trey Arch is perfect or W@W guarantees success for their next game, but I'm also not going to write them off because IW is breaking up. Mostly though I'm tired of them being bashed in pretty much any article that mentions CoD or IW. Even if the news has nothing to do with TA you can pretty much guarantee that someone is going to bring them up and start bashing them. It's just old.

And just to add to what I said a minute ago, being given an engine doesn't mean automatic success. You need look no further than the Unreal Engine to see that. One one hand you have games like Gears of War, Rainbow Six, and BioShock while on the other you have games like Legendary, Blacksite, and Turok. That's why I don't think that not having access to IWs engine is an automatic death sentence. They can still get engines elsewhere and make great games with them.

@Vidikron

WaW was a cool-looking game, and fun to play. I didn't like the grenade spam, which felt like a cheap way to make the game hard, but it was an above-average game, IMO.

Yeah, there are many good engines out there. When I say engine, though, I'm really also talking about gun aiming, weapon balancing, spawns, flow, and other gameplay decisions that a dev has to put into the game itself. These creative decisions don't simply come out of a box. They're all the intangibles that make a game either good, pretty good, or in the case of Halo/MW--top of the line.

This whole Activision thing reminds me of Jerry Jones firing Jimmy Johnson after back-to-back Superbowl wins. Barry Switzer, the replacement, also won a title with the same team that Johnson had coached--so the owner Jones could say, "see, I told you anyone could win with this team."

But since then ... where have the Cowboys been.

Yet devs like Robomodo get more money and staff.

Because at Activision, you fail upwards!

Because at Sovietvision, Profit margins you!

@Kinsey

Give that man a cookie! LOL!

EA is like the less rich brother who is just greatful for the CHANCE of meatloaf.

WHAT ABOUT THE MASHED POTATOES!?

at least EA has changed

Let me try, Bungie is like a romantic husband, whatever he gives his
wife she laps it up because it's good.

Drats, Bungie is a dev not a publisher but this metaphor is kinda fun.

MiCHAEL WHAT HAPPENED TO YOU!?

hmmm.....oh yeah that

yeah that happens from time to time, you get used to it, Aquacharger

BITCH I SAID RIBEYE

...I'm really gonna have to disagree with you on that