TheRetroArcade
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Posts: 1,967
Joined: Feb 2026
Joined: Feb 2026
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Every Friday
GamesRadar+
Your weekly update on everything you could ever want to know about the games you already love, games we know you're going to love in the near future, and tales from the communities that surround them.
Every Thursday
GTA 6 O'clock
Our special GTA 6 newsletter, with breaking news, insider info, and rumor analysis from the award-winning GTA 6 O'clock experts.
Every Friday
Knowledge
From the creators of Edge: A weekly videogame industry newsletter with analysis from expert writers, guidance from professionals, and insight into what's on the horizon.
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The Setup
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The Watchlist
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Get full access to premium articles, exclusive features and a growing list of member rewards.
This week: Made progress in Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun, the best throwback FPS I've ever played.
When a casual FPS enjoyer expresses a preference for a particular feature of Call of Duty, they are unknowingly picking a side. The way soldiers run, how attachments work, the shape of the maps—seemingly minor details are live ammo in a 20 year war between factions of gaming's strangest fandom.
A normal long-running game series is likely to have a singular direction—a continuity or consensus that determines what present and future iterations will look like. When Assassin's Creed shifted from stealth action games to lite RPGs in 2017, that became the direction for all of Ubisoft's studios making Assassin's Creed games. Not Call of Duty: it has a coalition of 11 studios working around the clock to produce a $70 videogame every 12 months, and those studios are rarely on the same page. Activision's fiefdoms collaborate to varying degrees to get the job done, but its two lead studios have very different, often opposing ideas of how Call of Duty should look, play, and evolve.
As Call of Duty attempts to rebound from its weakest year in a decade, it's worth examining this unusual arrangement. Activision's stringent schedule and widening creative differences, now spanning two decades, have created a splintered series mirrored in its increasingly tribalistic players. It's the Call of Duty schism, and it's fascinating.
Generally speaking, there are two studios steering Call of Duty's creative direction: Infinity Ward, the OG creators of the series and Modern Warfare, and Treyarch, the creators of Black Ops. The pair have taken turns with their takes on the bestselling military shooter since 2006, when Treyarch was tapped to make Call of Duty 3 (as well as 2005's Big Red One) while Infinity Ward took extra time on the first Modern Warfare (2007).
While it's fair to say Treyarch was the "secondary" Call of Duty studio in those early days, Black Ops (2010) changed that. With its campy Cold War spy story, non-traditional guns, and party modes, Black Ops established Treyarch as the "fun" Call of Duty studio....Read more: Full article on www.pcgamer.com
What do you think about this?
When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works.
Keep up to date with the most important stories and the best deals, as picked by the PC Gamer team.
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Unlock instant access to exclusive member features.
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Want to add more newsletters?
Every Friday
GamesRadar+
Your weekly update on everything you could ever want to know about the games you already love, games we know you're going to love in the near future, and tales from the communities that surround them.
Every Thursday
GTA 6 O'clock
Our special GTA 6 newsletter, with breaking news, insider info, and rumor analysis from the award-winning GTA 6 O'clock experts.
Every Friday
Knowledge
From the creators of Edge: A weekly videogame industry newsletter with analysis from expert writers, guidance from professionals, and insight into what's on the horizon.
Every Thursday
The Setup
Hardware nerds unite, sign up to our free tech newsletter for a weekly digest of the hottest new tech, the latest gadgets on the test bench, and much more.
Every Wednesday
Switch 2 Spotlight
Sign up to our new Switch 2 newsletter, where we bring you the latest talking points on Nintendo's new console each week, bring you up to date on the news, and recommend what games to play.
Every Saturday
The Watchlist
Subscribe for a weekly digest of the movie and TV news that matters, direct to your inbox. From first-look trailers, interviews, reviews and explainers, we've got you covered.
Once a month
SFX
Get sneak previews, exclusive competitions and details of special events each month!
Join the club
Get full access to premium articles, exclusive features and a growing list of member rewards.
This week: Made progress in Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun, the best throwback FPS I've ever played.
When a casual FPS enjoyer expresses a preference for a particular feature of Call of Duty, they are unknowingly picking a side. The way soldiers run, how attachments work, the shape of the maps—seemingly minor details are live ammo in a 20 year war between factions of gaming's strangest fandom.
A normal long-running game series is likely to have a singular direction—a continuity or consensus that determines what present and future iterations will look like. When Assassin's Creed shifted from stealth action games to lite RPGs in 2017, that became the direction for all of Ubisoft's studios making Assassin's Creed games. Not Call of Duty: it has a coalition of 11 studios working around the clock to produce a $70 videogame every 12 months, and those studios are rarely on the same page. Activision's fiefdoms collaborate to varying degrees to get the job done, but its two lead studios have very different, often opposing ideas of how Call of Duty should look, play, and evolve.
As Call of Duty attempts to rebound from its weakest year in a decade, it's worth examining this unusual arrangement. Activision's stringent schedule and widening creative differences, now spanning two decades, have created a splintered series mirrored in its increasingly tribalistic players. It's the Call of Duty schism, and it's fascinating.
Generally speaking, there are two studios steering Call of Duty's creative direction: Infinity Ward, the OG creators of the series and Modern Warfare, and Treyarch, the creators of Black Ops. The pair have taken turns with their takes on the bestselling military shooter since 2006, when Treyarch was tapped to make Call of Duty 3 (as well as 2005's Big Red One) while Infinity Ward took extra time on the first Modern Warfare (2007).
While it's fair to say Treyarch was the "secondary" Call of Duty studio in those early days, Black Ops (2010) changed that. With its campy Cold War spy story, non-traditional guns, and party modes, Black Ops established Treyarch as the "fun" Call of Duty studio....Read more: Full article on www.pcgamer.com
What do you think about this?