Sledgehammer Wants to Return to Cancelled Third Person Call of Duty Title

Call of Duty: Black Ops was partially set in Vietnam during the height of the Cold War and it seems Advanced Warfare developer Sledgehammer Games was making another game which would have taken place during this era but in a first for the franchise, the game was being developed as a third person title.

Speaking to GameInformer, Sledgehammer co-founder Glen Schofield revealed that the game was in development for "at least six to eight months". 

Schofield and fellow studio co-founder Michael Condrey had helped develop the first Dead Space at EA Visercal and the duo wanted to inject some of that game's atmosphere into this new game. 

Schofield added, “I was really getting into the story. We had some really cool mechanics.”

The cramped corridors and enemy infested space stations of Dead Space would have been replaced by dense jungle with section based in the underground corridors created by the Vietcong. 

"We were definitely getting some Dead Space moments," Schofield elaborated. "I don't mean that from sci-fi, I mean that was a war that was scary for the [American soldiers]. They didn't know if in the jungle there was a booby trap, or what was in those tunnels. And there were thousands of miles of tunnel underground. It was a hidden war."

Largely set in Cambodia, the third person perspective of the game would have enabled new ways to fight and allowed for scenes which just aren't possible in first person. 

However, the game was cancelled by Activision when it became clear Infinity Ward needed help finishing Modern Warfare 3. 

"Let's be frank, Infinity Ward was going through some transition," Condrey said, alluding to the departures of studio founders Jason West and Vince Zampella as well as numerous key staff. "We were growing with a triple-A team here, and the chance to work on the biggest game at that time and this fiction and space was super exciting for us.

"We would've loved to have made [the third-person Call of Duty]. It was in a space that we enjoyed, but how does anything compare to the first-person blockbuster release of 2011?"

Perhaps Advanced Warfare will encourage Activision to allow Sledgehammer the chance to return to the game.