14 DAY TRIAL // Sledgehammer Games confirms that its development team had to go back to the original designs of the multiplayer maps in Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare so that they could facilitate some of the sci-fi technology in the new game, such as boost jumps or dashes, which broke regular level design.
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare is set to debut next month, and developer Sledgehammer Games is entering the final stretch of development, putting the finishing touches on the game across all of its modes, from the single-player story campaign to the multiplayer experience that includes both cooperative and competitive game types.
Multiplayer maps were redesigned after sci-fi tech was fleshed out
According to Sledgehammer Games' Glenn Schofield, the studio developed the multiplayer maps from the beginning, but as soon as the futuristic features were nailed down, such as the exoskeleton and its array of powers, like the boost jump, many levels had to be redesigned so that they couldn’t be broken by players using their abilities.
Schofield tells Digital Spy that the whole process lasted around two years, but since Advanced Warfare has a three-year development cycle, it wasn't such a big deal and the team had time to focus.
"[Maps] took two years because first, you get to design them the way you know, then you're playing and playing constantly [to make sure they're balanced]," he says.
"Then as the boost jump started to solidify more, then it's like, 'Oh, they can get on the roof.' You just can't go back and add that. You got to design. We ripped parts of the level out, and rebuilt it. I would bet there are places that wouldn't go to that ripping stuff out and start over again. Again, with three years, we had that time to do that."
Sledgehammer has two separate teams
Schofield also confirms that the studio is split between the single-player and multiplayer teams, but that the two sides constantly work together, lending ideas and prototyping new things that can work in either one or both modes.
"Multiplayer might come up with something very cool and in single player, one of the designers might go, 'I want to get that in my level'. There was very good communication there, they're a very collaborative studio," Schofield explains.
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare is set to debut on November 4 worldwide for the PC, PS3, PS4, Xbox 360, and Xbox One platforms.
