In 2013’s Call of Duty: Ghosts, Infinity Ward decided to move away from the Spec Ops co-op mode from the Modern Warfare series and do something in the vein of Treyarch’s zombies mode. This is how Extinction was born, an objective-based co-op mode where players would battle alien creatures while completing a mission. It was notably different from zombies due to the fact it wasn’t round-based and had players progressing through one big map, as opposed to rotating through a smaller one. It was a unique and challenging mode, but one that didn’t resonate as strongly as zombies did.
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It turns out that Infinity Ward almost continued Extinction in Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare. Former Call of Duty developer Brian Bright and Lee Ross talked about the concept for Extinction 2, even going as far as to hype up an internal video that has never been released. The mode would have featured a base-building mechanic, something that Fortnite‘s Save the World mode would utilize the following year, and some real-time strategy mechanics. Bright noted that part of the reason Extinction 2 was scrapped was because the studio already had a lot of anxiety about taking the series to space and they didn’t want the game to feature aliens. Although not traditional aliens, he also noted that cryptids were “technically aliens” that came to Earth millions of years ago and were hibernating underground prior to being awoken. Bright also stated had they moved forward with the mode, the much more beloved zombies mode from Infinite Warfare would’ve never happened.
Infinite Warfare‘s zombies was a blast, but there is something about Extinction that sounds a bit more appealing. For starters, it’s different and helps alleviate some zombies fatigue, but it also sounded pretty innovative. Having an RTS, base building mode within one of the biggest shooters of all-time sounds like something that’s just ambitious enough to work.
Would you have been interested in seeing Infinity Ward continue Extinction? Let me know in the comments below or hit me up on Twitter @Cade_Onder.
[H/T CharlieIntel]
