STACK #157 Nov 2017

GAMES FEATURE

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War Narrative director at Sledgehammer Games, ScottWhitney, talks Call of Duty:WorldWar II campaign with STACK . Words Paul Jones

B ack in 2008, the Call of Duty franchise left the battlefields of World War II in search of new ways to excite an audience seeking bigger and better bangs. Gamers had grown tired of vintage warfare. WWII first-person shooters had, at that point, been a regular on the release sheet for ten years with Medal of Honor and Call of Duty competing in the triple-A space. The popularity of Saving Private Ryan (1997), a film that revolutionised the way war films were shot, led to a new era of first-person shooters. Spearheaded by the Spielberg- produced Medal of Honor (1999), this new wave of games successfully merged the vibrato of a big screen Hollywood production with traditional shooter mechanics. Ironically, it was a group of Medal of Honor developers, disenfranchised with EA, who had a vision for a new series. Working with Activision, and initially on PC only, the gritty Call of Duty franchise was born.

In 2007, Infinity Ward took a gamble with Call of Duty: Modern Warfare , opening up new horizons for the series. By the time Treyarch released World at War a year later, interest in the conflict had evaporated. However time heals all wounds, and the Sniper Elite series and the Wolfenstein reboot proved that there was still life in WWII. “By the time our game comes out, it will

At E3 this year, we were blown away by the weapons audio during our demo. So what’s the deal then? “Our audio team did amazing work on weapon sound effects for this game. This all starts with high quality field recordings – tracking down and capturing the sound of dozens of authentic World War II-era weapons being fired on a shooting range. “But from there, they layer in additional elements – so for instance, you don’t just get the ‘boom’ of a grenade but also the sound of nearby rocks on the ground shattering in response to the blast. “As a result, you deliver both more of realism and impact that really help take the sound design to the next level.”

...it felt like a perfect time for a return to the roots of the franchise

have been nearly a decade since Call of Duty has focused on World War II,” says narrative director on Call of Duty: World War II Scott Whitney, speaking with STACK last month.

“Based on that and from what we were hearing from the fans, it felt like a perfect time for a return to the roots of the franchise. “At the same time, it’s fair to say there’s something very special about World War II as a setting. Even though the last shots of the war were fired more than 70 years ago, it still holds a fascination for modern audiences. This conflict reshaped our world in so many ways and it still has lessons to teach us.” Out of all the wars that took place during

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