'Call of Duty: Black Ops 4' Video Discusses the History of Zombies

Call of Duty: Black Ops 4's latest video looks back at 10 years of Zombies and how it's changed leading up to the new game.

Starting with Call of Duty: World at War, Treyarch's new video has Treyarch's Jason Blundell, senior executive producer for Zombies, explaining the origins of the game mode. Considering how important of a fixture Zombies has been in Call of Duty games in past years, it's easy to forget that it was actually an Easter egg in World at War as opposed to a standalone game mode available right from the start. The campaign had to be finished first before it was unlocked, and Blundell said that there was a deal in place with Activision to not promote the game mode much seeing how it was such an atypical part of the Call of Duty formula.

"Because it was so experimental and because we were doing a very serios title with World at War, the deal was made with Activision that we wouldn't promote it, we wouldn't market it, we wouldn't talk about it," Blundell said. "We just got this cry from the community of like 'Give us more, give us more.' So we kept on going. I don't' think anyone expected the size and the popularity, and the kind of speed of growth for the Zombie community."

Growing from an end-game unlockable to a full-fledged game mode that's been supported throughout Call of Duty games after World at War, Blundell said that the progress that's been made leading up to Black Ops 4 has gotten Treyarch to the point that they can "take that next big jump." Black Ops 4's take on Zombies certainly looks to do that as well with the game breaking away from the Aether storyline that's guided the events of past Call of Duty games.

Showing off scenes from the three Zombies scenarios that the new game will launch with, Blundell moved away from the history of the game mode and looked ahead to the future. The new Zombies mode will include "Nine," "Voyage of Despair," and "Blood of the Dead." The first puts players back in time in a gladiator arena with an all-new cast of characters, the second puts them aboard the Titanic, and the last lets players revisit the "Mob of the Dead" map from Black Ops 2.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 releases with its Zombies, multiplayer, and Blackout battle royale mode on October 12th.