With Treyarch making so many changes to the Call of Duty series with the next installment, Black Ops 2, many gamers are already starting to wonder where Infinity Ward will take the series next. After Black Ops 2 comes out, it’ll be back to Infinity Ward to develop the next game. Let’s look at some of the rumors and try and anticipate what seems most likely.
The most obvious guess is probably Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4, a direct sequel to Modern Warfare 3. Why is this not the most likely possibility? Video games tend to come out as trilogies, which means that MW3 should neatly have wrapped up this particular arc. With the fact that Treyarch also has sent us charging into the future with Black Ops 2 set in the year 2025, it also seems like going back in time would be, well, going backwards. As such perhaps we should set our sights even further into the future. It’s highly rumored that the next Infinity Ward Call of Duty game could be Call of Duty in Space.
It seems to us that this rumor has some sense in it, and there’s a lot of great potential for a game like that, but it doesn’t seem likely that the series will take this big a leap next year for a couple of reasons. The first is that Treyarch’s leap to the near future is already considered a decision that invites considerable uncertainty as to reception. While we think the game will be a hit, we also think that Infinity Ward will want to see the evidence before continuing in the direction of change. The other reason that we think that the game will likely not jump that far next year is that the near-future setting still leaves a lot of unexplored territory. If Black Ops 2 is a hit, why not continue to explore the evolution of technology and warfare in the near future for another game or two before embarking into the far reaches of space?