Since its introduction in 2019's Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, players have been flocking to Warzone to test themselves in Call of Duty's take on battle royale. Verdansk has been the battleground for players, whether it was the more modern setting from its first year or the city as it was in 1984 as part of the Soviet Union. This is going to change, as players will be jumping into World War 2 Pacific and Sledgehammer Games has given players a tease of what's to come in Call of Duty: Vanguard.
Call of Duty: Vanguard is 2021's entry into the long-running series, the third from Sledgehammer Games, and the second from the studio set in World War 2. The campaign follows a multinational unit, dubbed Task Force One, as they try to uncover the truth about a hidden Nazi plan called Project Phoenix in the dying days of World War 2. Multiplayer, Zombies, and Warzone are also available as part of the game, with the latter of the three trading the Cold War for World War 2.
Sledgehammer gave players a tease as to why they are heading to the Pacific Theater in the cinematic intro for Vanguard's iteration of Warzone. The intro sees Black Ops Cold War's Adler, Woods, Mason, and Hudson discovering a Nazi bunker hidden in Verdansk's underbelly, along with the returning Captain Carver Butcher from Call of Duty WW2. He reveals he was the mastermind behind Vanguard's team and their "work" saw them head to the Pacific island of Caldera after the war to find the Nazis who fled Germany before Berlin fell.
Despite the emphasis on multiplayer, Call of Duty's developer has provided players a narrative hook as to why they were fighting in Verdansk. In both cases, Warzone's narrative continued from where Modern Warfare and Cold War's campaigns left off and found ways to involve the key characters from the respective campaigns. It's also given the series' developers a way to have loose narrative threads both season-to-season and even game-to-game since 2019's Modern Warfare.
It appears this will be the same going into Call of Duty: Vanguard when players drop into the island of Caldera on December 3. The cinematic suggests Project Phoenix is somewhat successful if Butcher teases the Nazi presence there was the driving reason behind attacking the island. The question now becomes where Warzone heads over the next year and how, ultimately, it will link into this larger, interconnected Call of Duty thru-line.
Call of Duty: Vanguard will be available November 5, 2021, on PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.