Call of Duty: Warzone is quickly becoming a major player in Activision's business. The free-to-play battle royale game has over 80 million players at last check, making it arguably the biggest Call of Duty in progress. While it was clear that Infinity Ward was leading development for the first year, the Modern Warfare studio has been completely silent on the game in the past month.

Which begs the question: who the hell is flying the planes at Warzone's headquarters?

Oddly enough, Activision does not seem interested in confirming this. When asked which studio is currently leading the development of Warzone, the spokesperson simply replied, "Infinity Ward and Raven Software are developing it. This short answer does not answer the question of who is leading the development of "Warzone" now, ten months after its release, but it does suggest that Raven Software will take the lead on "Warzone.

Since the launch of Black Ops - Cold War Season 1 in December, Raven (the supporting studio for CoD, which also created the Cold War campaign) has been the face of Warzone's ongoing updates, while Infinity Ward remains silent, Raven's official Twitter account has been the source of official patch information and cosmetic announcements. Or is Raven just putting out balancing updates while Infinity Ward is working on major updates like the rumored new map?

First, it's really odd (and a little annoying) that Activision isn't being open about the ongoing development of their biggest game; Warzone has a large number of dedicated fans who are hyper-sensitive to balance changes. Communication is a big part of that, so it was shocking to see Raven become the new voice of Warzone at the end of 2020 without any mention. If millions of people have to read the latest patch notes elsewhere to keep up with the game, Activision should make that clear.

Speaking of patch notes, the fact that Raven is apparently leading the development means that Warzone's meta could change significantly in the future. Infinity Ward updates over the past year have maintained a meta where one or two guns have always been either overperforming or completely broken. Raven's vision for the game is still a mystery, and while their efforts in recent weeks to squash DMR 14's meta are encouraging, time will tell if Warzone's biggest problem will be solved in 2021. Cheaters are still rampant and balance-busting exploits are commonplace.

If Raven is now Warzone's studio, it also sparks speculation as to what Infinity Ward is up to; given the success of Modern Warfare, there is no doubt that a proper sequel is in the works. Keeping the upcoming project a secret could also be a reason for Activision not to say whether or not Infinity Ward has stepped away from Warzone. In any case, a theoretical sequel to Modern Warfare is still a year or two away.

To be clear, Raven is a good studio, and if they actually own the project, the game is in capable hands; before focusing on Call of Duty, Raven was working on other memorable FPSs. Below is a brief history of the studio over the past 15 years.

Raven Software's official TwitterRaven's official Twitter account has been sending out updates for Warzone for the past month.

Call of Duty Official TwitterWhile primarily focused on "Black Ops - Cold War" (and possibly whatever the 2021 CoD will be), it retweets news from Warzone and mentions new information added to the game. sometimes.

The Call of Duty blogCall of Duty's catch-all blog usually has news posts dedicated to new cosmetic bundles, but is hit or miss about patch notes. Recently, Raven has been releasing rough details on Twitter without blogging about it at all.

And here, of course. Activision is making Warzone fandom more difficult than it needs to be, but fortunately, it's my job to simplify it, and if you follow me on Twitter or check the Warzone tag regularly, you'll get updates.