Activision let us know this would be happening back in June, and the day has finally come, or very nearly. What is tomorrow at time of writing, Thursday September 21, 2023, the original Call Of Duty: Warzone will be shut down, and Warzone 2.0 will officially take over.
The original Warzone wasn’t the beginning of the popularity of battle royale, but if anything it further cemented the genre into the gaming landscape potentially forever.
It was the beginning of a new era in live service and in battle royale titles. Warzone was everywhere, and it brought the Call Of Duty gameplay generally locked behind an annual paywall of $60, now $70 for each new game, to everyone for free.
A huge chunk of that can be credited to Verdansk, one of the best maps to ever grace the battle royale genre, one that players still talk of fondly, even with the success of more recent maps in 2.0 like Al Mazrah and Vondel.
Verdansk’s successor, Caldera, never did get quite the same love, but no matter if you were a fan or not, it’ll be gone forever when servers are shut down tomorrow.
For Call Of Duty, and perhaps even the whole battle royale genre, it’s the end of an era for sure. It’s also another sign at how fleeting this digital age can be, and how the preservation of live service games is such an uphill battle.
Especially when Activision is sending cease and desist notices to those trying to keep these games alive for players.
At least anything you’ve purchased within Warzone Caldera will still be available to you, though only in Vanguard, Modern Warfare, and Black Ops Cold War multiplayer modes.
Source – [Activision, Dexerto]