'Call of Duty: Black Ops 4's Zombies Mode Isn't Connected to the Aether Story

Call of Duty's Zombies game mode is rife with secrets and Easter eggs that weave the games together in a 10-year story, but Treyarch says that Call of Duty: Black Ops 4's Zombies is definitively not connected to the events in past games.

Diehard Zombies players will know that the overarching Aether storyline that spans hundreds of years in the Zombies timeline with multiple games and even more characters from different factions facilitating the events that circulate around the undead. It's a complex story, one that's hard to penetrate if you're jumping into one of Call of Duty's later games that can still be played as their own entities but contain references and plot devices that make more sense if you understand what came before them.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 4, however, does not continue this story that's been established over the past 10 years. Speaking to Game Informer, Jason Blundell, Treyarch's director of Zombies for Call of Duty: Black Ops 4, spoke about the game's split from the existing story and said in no confusing terms that the two storylines aren't connected.

"They are not connected. They are not connected," Blundell said, the second time looking directly into the camera to stress the point. "They are not connected in any way. They are two separate stories completely."

With how connected story elements are in Call of Duty's Zombies modes that often contain the slightest of details, hidden messages, and Easter egg requirements that can usually only be found through in-depth guides, Blundell said some people still aren't buying it when he says the two aren't connected. He added that he's said this multiple times to people that the previously established story and the new game aren't connected, but he says people still don't believe him.

Regarding Treyarch's decision to end the previous story and start anew with Zombies, Blundell said that the convoluted Aether storyline was one that fervent Zombies players enjoyed but was also "incredibly complicated and proved daunting for new players to get into. He said that the fanbase loved that aspect of the story, but another group of players had a hard time jumping into it.

"But there's a part of our community coming in a little later on," he said. "It's almost unfair to them to be able to kind of jump into that 10-year story and kind of find their footing, so we felt that now was the perfect time to start a new story."

Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 with its Blackout, multiplayer, and Zombies modes releases on Oct. 12.