There Was Never A Plan To Have A Single-Player Campaign in Black Ops 4

Yesterday, it was non-stop Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 news as Activision and Treyarch revealed the game to the world, accompanied by a dump of new media and information. Of this massive dump, was confirmation that the game will not have a single-player campaign, something that was previously rumored, but never confirmed.

Naturally, this stole quite a bit of headlines and created a sizeable storm of backlash. While the single-player campaign is far from the key selling point for the Call of Duty series – it has been in the third row behind Zombies and multiplayer for awhile – it is enjoyed every year by many. But that won't be the case this year.

Doing what it does best, the Internet broke out into speculation as to why Activision and co. are ditching the campaign. One of the most popular theories: in order to do the game's battle-royale mode called Blackout. Seems like a reasonable theory, but it's wrong.

Speaking to Polygon, Dan Bunting, studio head at Treyarch, noted that it never had a traditional campaign in the works, not even when they began development almost three years ago.

"When we set out to make this game, we never started with the idea that we would make a traditional campaign," said Bunting. "That was just not part of our plan. We started from a place that we were gonna make a game that across the board can be playable with friends. That's been our mission from day one.

"Of course, through the course of development, as always happens with every game, we're to challenge our conventions … trying different things. Sometimes those things are bold and crazy and innovative sometimes things work out, sometimes they don't work out. As development goes on though, you're always pushing the best ideas forward and that's what was reflected today."

Bunting went on to reveal what many have suspected for a long time: the data shows that not many players engage with the campaign, which is a big reason why it is being left behind.

"When I first started on multiplayer in the Call of Duty franchise, 10 percent of our population was playing competitive multiplayer,"said Bunting. "Fast forward to 2015 or 2016, you're looking at 90 percent of our players are playing multiplayer … If you look at it through that lens, and trying to deliver more for your players and how you're playing the game, it's a pretty easy decision. I realize it's also a challenging decision for other reasons. But we've never been ones to shy away from a challenge."

Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 is poised to release on October 12th, for PS4, Xbox One, and PC. To make sure you're up-to-date on all the latest news, check out all of our previous coverage of the game right here.