A full reveal will happen later this year, the company announced. Warzone 2 has been something fans and industry insiders have speculated about long before we heard any official word, but now the cat is finally out of the bag. It’s about time, too - Warzone, despite still being among the most popular battle royales out there has been struggling, due in no small part to the underperforming Vanguard release. Activision has already revealed that this year’s mainline Call of Duty game will be Modern Warfare 2, sequel to 2019’s Modern Warfare which also holds the title of the most successful game in the franchise to date. Considering the weight the Modern Warfare subline has among fans, attaching a sequel to Warzone to this upcoming title definitely makes sense - especially since the battle royale initially launched alongside the 2019 game.
— Infinity Ward (@InfinityWard) April 28, 2022 While Modern Warfare 2 itself will launch this year, presumably sometime during the traditional November window, Warzone 2 is expected to come a bit later, in early 2023. This aligns with the gap between Modern Warfare’s release and that of Warzone, and it makes sense from a business standpoint too; they will be close enough to still have positive feedback on each other’s marketing, but not too close as to cannibalize each other’s success. New releases and sequels almost always mean player spikes, and we can easily see Warzone 2 causing the title to skyrocket back to the top of the pile after a year of hemorrhaging players - over 50 million have quit Warzone recently. Veteran and fan-favorite developer Infinity Ward is helming both projects, so everyone has a great deal of confidence in the releases after the franchise has been in a bit of a slump. A full, proper reveal of Warzone 2 - expect trailers, screenshots and details about the map and gameplay - will be coming later this year, probably closer to when Modern Warfare 2 launches. Activision must be excited about the prospect of the free to play battle royale sequel if they’re essentially pre-announcing an announcement, but that’s how AAA marketing rolls these days. Based on how frequent leaks have become in the industry, you can probably bet on hearing or seeing some classified Warzone 2 intel ahead of time, though - stay tuned for news, official or otherwise.
