Call of Duty: Modern Warfare will not have Zombies

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Hordes of undead aren't a good fit with the experience that Infinity Ward is trying to create.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare will have grit. It will have ripped headlines. It will have a mustache the size of Belgium. It will have politics. What it will not have, however, is legions of the angry undead. Campaign gameplay director Jacob Minkoff confirmed with PlayStation Lifestyle that the rebooted Modern Warfare will not have a Zombies mode. 

Treyarch's Black Ops games are also grim-and-gritty, but Minkoff said they're more of a "stylized, graphic novel, superhero experience," and so they can pull that sort of thing off. "But for us, we’re trying to create an authentic, realistic feeling world," he said. "We don’t have the flexibility to do something like put zombies in the game. That would compromise the feeling of playing in a world that feels realistic and authentic and relative to today’s conflicts and things we face." 

Modern Warfare will support some form of co-op play, however. Minkoff declined to share details but said that "the single-player storyline goes directly into the co-op storyline. No stop. The events just continue. So those elements—gameplay, progression, story—they just continue throughout everything that we have on the disc or digital download." 

Activision said when Call of Duty: Modern Warfare was announced that it will lean more heavily into the "uncomfortable realities of war" than earlier games in the series; based on Chris' preview of the campaign, it sounds like there might be a few stumbles along that path, but I'm hopeful that Infinity Ward can pull it off. It comes out on October 25. 

Andy Chalk
Andy Chalk
US News Lead

Andy has been gaming on PCs from the very beginning, starting as a youngster with text adventures and primitive action games on a cassette-based TRS80. From there he graduated to the glory days of Sierra Online adventures and Microprose sims, ran a local BBS, learned how to build PCs, and developed a longstanding love of RPGs, immersive sims, and shooters. He began writing videogame news in 2007 for The Escapist and somehow managed to avoid getting fired until 2014, when he joined the storied ranks of PC Gamer. He covers all aspects of the industry, from new game announcements and patch notes to legal disputes, Twitch beefs, esports, and Henry Cavill. Lots of Henry Cavill.