The Battle Royale genre became quite saturated over the past few years as companies attempted to cash in and grab some of that success that Fortnite had begun to see. Still, in order to really compete with the top games in this genre such as the previously mentioned Fortnite or Respawn Entertainment's successful Apex Legends, new games needed to bring something new to the table. While Call of Duty: Warzone was built on top of an already popular IP and free to play, it also introduced a number of unique features such as the Gulag, which gave fallen players another chance to drop back in.
In a recent interview, Raven Software’s Creative Director Amos Hodge discussed how the feature came to be during the development of Call of Duty: Warzone. As Raven began to start working on Warzone, Infinity Ward was also working on the 2v2 Gunfight mode and the studios became to share ideas. One in particular was to give players a way to control ways to get back into the game mode through teammates.
However, Raven's developers also wanted to find a method that would be available to all players and was independent from solely relying on the player's teammates since not every squad will be as tight knit as others. The other element that the studio wanted to lean into was the feeling that a player gets when earning their way back into the match. With Gunfight showing promise, the team started prototyping a small mechanic that focused solely on gun play.
Numerous tests tried a whole bunch of different variants of what Warzone features today. Some versions allowed players who won to return to battle with their full loadout, Gulag matches that gave players access to the exact Gulag loadout, and even returning them without anything at all. Ultimately, developers settled on the pistol as it didn't leave players completely defenseless and wasn't strong enough to overwhelm active players.
In order to make sure the match could quickly serve all defeated players, six Gulag locations were added under the map with three different map variations in total. This helped the Gulag not to feel overly repetitive and get people back into the action at a much fast pace. Better yet, Hodge confirmed that the studio has plans to refresh Gulag starting loadouts and other new content in future updates, though he won't reveal any more than that.
While the Gulag mechanic has proven to be popular with players, the latest playlist update has actually removed it completely from the Solos mode. Instead, the new Stimulus Solos mode allows players to respawn as many times as they want after being taken down as long as they can pay their way back in. All players start with enough cash to respawn once, though players can instead opt to spend that cash which could give them an advantage but may cost them the ability to come back.
Call of Duty: Warzone is available now for PC, PS4, and Xbox One.
Source: CharlieIntel