14 DAY TRIAL // It seems that something rather ugly went on behind the scenes in the last few days at developer Infinity Ward, the outfit in charge of the biggest videogame released in 2009, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. Now, two of the most important men at the company are no longer working there and it appears that further content planned for their first person shooter hit might never see the light of day.
The two men who left are Jason West, the president of Infinity Ward and one of the men who co-founded the company back in 2001, and Vince Zampella, the Chief Executive Officer.
Both their LinkedIn profiles are saying that they are no longer working with the company and a photo taken of the Facebook profile of West, widely circulated on fan forums, is saying that he is no longer employed and that he is currently occupying his time by drinking.
The actual reasons for their sudden departures are sketchy at the moment but reports coming out of Infinity Ward suggest that a very heated exchange happened between both Zampella and West and some important figures from publisher Activision Blizzard. It seems that there were tensions between the two entities for some time related to the future of the Modern Warfare franchise, which Infinity Ward is most associated with.
Infinity Ward and Activision were set to launch a map pack for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 during the spring, exclusive for the Xbox 360 platform from Microsoft. It's not clear whether the content is done and whether the latter can itself put it out without further support from the former. The developers were also said to be working on a new intellectual property probably due to be revealed later in 2010.