Call of Duty's Zombies began as 'an indie game inside a multi-million dollar project'

By Gabe Gurwin November 7, 2015

Call of Duty Zombies: The Secret History

Treyarch’s Call of Duty games have featured the now-famous “Zombies” mode since 2008’s Call of Duty: World at War, which presented the mode as an Easter egg after completing the main campaign. In recent years, marketing for Zombies has only increased, culminating in this year’s Call of Duty: Black Ops III, with a character voiced by legendary weirdo Jeff Goldblum. But just how did Zombies come to be? PlayStation sat down with Black Ops III campaign and Zombies director Jason Blundell to find out.

Call of Duty: World at War still stands as the goriest game in the series, with detaching limbs and characters literally being blown to bits, and given the game’s focus on the vicious combat of the Pacific during World War II, it also put an emphasis on using flamethrowers. This meant that Treyarch had to animated soldiers burning alive, and according to Blundell, members of the team noticed that without the fire surrounding them, the soldiers appeared to be undead.

Without initially telling publisher Activision, the studio then began focusing on the mode, and eventually decided to keep the mode completely out of the game’s marketing materials to make it a strange surprise for players. Oh, how times have changed.

With the first Black Ops, the studio took the Zombies mode from “slightly odd” to full-blown absurdity, letting players control characters like Fidel Castro and JFK, and with the addition of new abilities and a more narrative-focused mode in Black Ops II, fine-tuning the experience became especially challenging.

“Zombie map kind of balancing is more about when people blame themselves,” Blundell explains. When people start blaming the map or a particular enemy for their failure is when something needs to be tweaked.

Call of Duty: Black Ops III is out now on PC, last-gen, and current-gen consoles, and its Zombies mode draws influence on Lovecraftian monsters in addition to its classic walking dead. Although the campaign has been omitted from the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 versions of the game, Zombies is still included.

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Gabe Gurwin has been playing games since 1997, beginning with the N64 and the Super Nintendo. He began his journalism career…

Gaming

The best field upgrades for Modern Warfare 3 Zombies

A man holding a mysterious glowing vial.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3's Zombies mode puts a slight twist on the mechanics you are already familiar with. It now plays much more like a souped-up DMZ mode rather than its old round-based format. And Field Upgrades have been modified in terms of both their effects and how you get them just for this game type. There are six different Field Upgrades you can bring into the map and use on a cooldown timer to help improve your chances of survival, but you can only pick one at a time. You will begin the game with only one option, but steadily unlock the rest as you level up. Once you have them all, the question then becomes which is the best Field Upgrade? We've managed to exfiltrate with the answer.

Healing Aura
Regardless of whether or not you're playing with a team or running solo, Healing Aura is no doubt the best Field Upgrade to bring on any Zombie run. When activated, you and any teammates in the area will not only gain immediate healing, but it will also instantly revive any downed teammates. The downside to all this power is that this upgrade has the slowest recharge time and is unlocked at level 19.
Aether Shroud
This is another upgrade that you will be glad to have. Aether Shroud makes you you temporary invisibile to all Zombies. This won't make you invincible, mind you, and PMCs can still take shots, but if you're getting swarmed and have no way to escape, becoming instantly invisible to a bloodthirsty pack of zombies can save your skin more often than you think. This upgrade has a medium recharge rate and is unlocked when you hit level 39.
Frenzied Guard
Just past the halfway mark, Frenzied Guard has a massive upside, but not without some risk. When you pop this Field Upgrade, you instantly repair all your armor, but also draw all the aggression of any enemy nearby for 10 seconds. However, another perk is that anything you kill during this time also repairs your armor, so situationally, it can be great or detrimental. This one recharges slowly, unlocking at level 9.
Frost Blast
Frost Blast does exactly what you expect: it fires a freezing blast that will slow down any enemy you hit with it and deal a bit of damage. It's decent in a pinch, but not a game-changer. You can get it when you hit level 29.
Tesla Storm
An odd ability on paper, Tesla Storm is only good if you have a team working together. Activating it will create a lightning chain between you and your team that will damage and stun enemies that get close to any one of you. It lasts for 10 seconds and can be great in the final moments while holding out for an extraction, but not in other situations. It recharges slowly and is the last upgrade you unlock at level 50.
Energy Mine
This is your default Field Upgrade, so it makes sense that it's the "worst" on the list. Energy Mine isn't exactly bad; you simply lay down a mine that does what a mine does -- explodes. It's just that setting up traps like this in Zombies isn't all that applicable except when kiting a boss around or waiting for the helicopter. It has a medium recharge speed.

Gaming

Modern Warfare 3 Zombies: Mercenary Convoy guide

Soldiers in a car driving and shooting zombies.

The old format of Zombies has been left behind in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 in favor of a more open-world, objective-based take on the undead survival game type. This time, you will squad up and drop into a map with specific objectives you can choose to complete to earn tons of XP, while also pushing the narrative forward and unlocking new, more difficult tasks to take on. The early-tier missions are generally very simple, but in Act 1, you will be given the objective to find and destroy a Mercenary Convoy somewhere on the map. This sounds easy enough on paper until you realize you have no idea where this convey is or how to find it. Every run in Zombies risks losing all your hard-earned progress, so we'll lead you to the Mercenary Convoy to take it out before the zombies even know you were there.
How to find the Mercenary Convoy

Your first challenge will be to find this Mercenary Convoy. The problem here is twofold: first is that it isn't marked on your map in any way, and second is that, being a convoy, it is mobile. Once you land, you and your team should find the nearest vehicle and head toward the center of the map. Depending on how the threat levels are on your particular map, you are looking for roads and highways that are around the medium-threat level zone. You will have to patrol these roads until you come across the convoy, which only consists of three vehicles. Once you are in range, it does appear on your map to let you know you've found it.

Gaming

Modern Warfare 3 Zombies: tips and tricks for MWZ

A soldier with a Pack-A-Punch weapon fires at zombies from behind cover.

The mega-popular Zombies mode has never undergone as massive of a restructuring as it has for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3. What was originally a round-based, co-op survival mode where you and a team of four gradually powered up, expanded the map, and maybe tried to complete a challenging Easter egg story has become something more of a mix of Zombies and the new DMZ mode from last year's entry.

While there will be plenty that is familiar to Zombies veterans, such as Perk-a-Colas and mystery boxes, you won't be able to rely on your old tactics anymore. Surviving the new Zombies mode is a completely new ballgame in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, but these tips and tricks will help you and your squad survive threats both old and new.
How is Modern Warfare 3 Zombies different than previous entries?