Call of Duty devs eager to copy Overwatch 2’s recent fan-made map event

Infinity Ward’s lead multiplayer developers would be down to copy Overwatch 2’s recent fan-made map-creation event, letting Call of Duty players in on the experience of designing a new battleground from scratch.

At the tail end of 2022, the Overwatch 2 dev team did something brand new on Twitch. For the first time, fans were able to peek under the hood and help design a multiplayer map from scratch. From placing key geometry to adding special quirks around the environment, players had their say in how it all came together.

Originally, it seemed this one-off Twitch stream was purely an experiment, some lighthearted fun in the holiday season. However, four months later, after some polishing up from Blizzard, and this community-built map actually made its way into the game. Overwatch 2 briefly featured a fan creation for all to enjoy in the more casual-oriented Arcade space.

In speaking with two lead multiplayer devs on the Call of Duty team, another mega-popular FPS franchise under the Activision Blizzard umbrella, we learned they’d very much be eager to do the same for their own title.

“I think that would be awesome,” Infinity Ward’s Multiplayer Design Director Geoff Smith replied as we pitched the idea in a recent interview. Clearly not opposed to letting fans in on the process and getting a little chaotic, he was instead enthusiastic about the idea, though with a slight catch.

For a community-designed map in the CoD series, they would have to start with a smaller play space, Smith explained.

“I think Battlefield did that, but those are much larger maps and I think that process took them six, eight months, maybe a year. So you get a lot of buy-in early on, then people kind of peter out.

“But I think that would be a super cool event to do. Maybe try to do a smaller map so it can turn around quicker.”

Obviously, nothing is set in stone, but Infinity Ward would certainly be up for it. Co-Design Director of Multiplayer Joseph Cecot even joked this smaller fan build could end up being “Shipment 2.”

We’ll just have to wait and see if an event of this kind ever comes to fruition on the CoD side. But given the success of the Overwatch 2 Twitch stream, and the map’s later arrival in-game, it would no doubt be fascinating to see what the CoD community would make.