First info on Call of Duty: World at War

CVG has got hold of the latest issue of Xbox 360: The Official Magazine – out Friday, June 13 – which contains the first info on Activision’s Call of Duty: World at War.

The game is in development at Treyarch, the studio responsible for Call of Duty 3, and returns the series to WWII. The setting is the Pacific theatre and Treyarch’s head Mark Lamir told the mag the game is “a scarier Call of Duty than we’ve ever seen”.

The developers have had a full year extra in development over the slightly sub par Call of Duty 3 and this game’s using the already proven engine that powered the brilliant Call of Duty 4.

The enemy AI has also been overhauled in order to more closely resemble the actions of the Japanese soldiers. Rather than taking cover and using flanking techniques as in European battles, the Japanese will hide in trees and sneak through the overgrowth to get up close.

“We figured out early that the Imperial Japanese fought in a different way that was full of suspense,” creative lead Rich Farrelly told OXM. “From that point we started to skew the game in that direction.”

The magazine also confirmed that the campaign in Call of Duty: World at War will feature four-player cooperative play over Xbox LIVE. Additionally the competitive multiplayer modes will sport meta game perks similar to those previously seen in Call of Duty 4.