During my visit to Infinity Ward, the studio spent hours walking through Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4’s three pillars: Campaign, Multiplayer, and DMZ. While the campaign introduces a new conflict on the Korean Peninsula and multiplayer delivers some of the biggest mechanical changes Call of Duty has ever seen, DMZ may be the mode that has changed the most since players last saw it years ago.
The extraction shooter returns as a third pillar of Modern Warfare 4’s offering, carrying years of lessons from its original beta, player feedback, and the broader growth in popularity of the extraction genre itself. Geoff Smith, Studio Multiplayer Creative Director, describes DMZ as being so large that it’s a game within a game.
We actually made a proper DMZ this time. We had a little bit more time.
Smith says Infinity Ward spent years examining what worked, what didn’t, and how player behavior evolved both inside DMZ and across extraction shooters more broadly.
“Watching the genre evolve. We’ve learned a lot about what resonates with players and what we were lacking in our beta, and all that knowledge and those action items became this foundation for us as we’re shaping this new vision of DMZ from the ground up.”
DMZ Takes Place After Modern Warfare 4’s Campaign
DMZ’s setting and loose narrative are directly connected to Modern Warfare 4’s story. Following a nuclear reactor meltdown on the Korean Peninsula, a massive exclusion zone forms across the region, leaving advanced military technology scattered throughout a war-torn landscape. Players step into the role of off-the-books CIA assets tasked with recovering that technology before it falls into the wrong hands.
This is the narrative explanation for there being a loot, a reason to enter and extract, and why there are no civilians living in Hajin, DMZ’s map.
“From the events in the single-player, there’s a nuclear reactor that melts down and creates this exclusion zone that DMZ takes place. Our story in DMZ picks up a little while after that campaign, and it ties directly into the greater Modern Warfare universe. In that world, DMZ offers a rich sandbox with escalating AI threats, dangerous bosses, environmental puzzles, raid-like operations, narrative-driven story missions. It’s really more than just a third mode. It’s a full featured game inside Modern Warfare, and progression is at the heart of the genre, and DMZ provides this full hero’s journey. We have an out of game forward operating base that acts as a hub for player progression and growth, and over time you acquire gear and the skill and the reputation to feel like a Tier 1 operator.”
The phrase “game within a game” came up repeatedly during the presentation and DMZ features all the must-haves from other extraction shooters, including dedicated progression, story missions, operator trait trees, crafting, a Forward Operating Base, and its own progression path separate from Modern Warfare 4’s main multiplayer. Let’s get into the map and details.
Hajin Is Built Around Exploration And Discovery
DMZ takes place on Hajin, a new large-scale map spanning South Korea, North Korea, and Russia. Unlike previous large Call of Duty maps, Hajin was developed alongside the campaign from the beginning, allowing the teams to build a shared history between the two experiences.
“Our big map, where DMZ takes place, is called Hajin. It’s unlike any map we’ve made before. It really kind of bugged me in previous maps we’ve made, like what caused everyone to leave? Why is there no one there? What is this inciting incident? And so, from day one, we worked with the single-player team and created all of this story, and we’ve had this nuclear reactor that melts down and you end up fighting through Hajin in the single-player, and so when you come back to it, in DMZ, all the different elements and things that you’ve seen are all frozen in place for you to come back to and discover.”
“A core pillar of this experience is exploration and discovery, telling stories through the environment and letting players unravel mysteries on their own helps the map become a character itself,” Smith continues. “Hajin is this polluted, war-torn battlefield, polluted by radiation, shaped by mass evacuations, and it’s left it abandoned and uninhabitable. This narrative set dress affects every deployment, from how you explore to how firefights unfold.”
Points of interest we identified on a visual of the DMZ map include Hajin City, Casino, Hospital, Broadcast, Farmlands, Fallout, MI Base, and Deadtown.
The Three Different Ways To Play DMZ in Modern Warfare 4
Infinity Ward structured DMZ around three distinct experiences: Story Missions, Dynamic Operations, and Free Roam. All three exist within the same shared world and players will generally (but not always) encounter players in a similar bucket.
Story Missions
Story Missions drive DMZ’s narrative and match players together based on the objective they’ve selected.
“Story missions tell the narrative of DMZ. In that trailer, you saw some sneak peeks of some of our story missions. They were going into a vault. We have another story mission where you’re going in and you’re trying to abduct a key general who’s wounded in the hospital and get him out to get intel from, and then we have a sneaking mission where you actually infiltrate an active military base, and that’s our hardest POI in Hajin. The cool thing is that when you choose story missions, you’re match made with a bunch of other players on that same story mission, so everyone has the same goal, the same clear objective.”
Dynamic Operations
Dynamic Operations build on traditional contract systems but add randomization to the objectives themselves.
“The contracts we built in the previous games, they kind of played out the same way. We randomized the locations, but the steps you took were always the same. So, once you did one once, you’re like, ‘okay, I get it, I get how that operation or that contract works.’ But in dynamic operations, we actually randomized the steps that you take, so when your boots hit the ground, the first thing you get is the main objective. We need to take out a key HVT. We need to blow up a missile before it can be launched. We need to go download some Intel, and then blow up a server room to cover our tracks. But the steps you take to achieve that main objective are different every time.”
Free Roam
Free Roam removes mission structure entirely and allows players to pursue their own objectives.
“Free roam is our option where once you feel like you have your feet underneath you, you understand the mechanics of DMZ, you understand the systems that exist, and you feel like you don’t need us to tell you what to do. You can just go in and do your own thing. The magic of DMZ is that all of these options play out in the same world at the same time.”
Modern Warfare 4’s DMZ is Full of AI Threats
One of Infinity Ward’s goals for DMZ was creating a world that reacts to what players do. Like in the beta and in other extraction shooters, there are. AI forces moving throughout the map. Weather also changes over time, and increasingly dangerous enemies appear as situations escalate, most notably based on your own behavior. More on that in the next section.
We have a saying in the studio as we develop DMZ, you push and the world pushes back.
“We have a very full, rich living world. We have air traffic that’s flying by, moving key cargo. We have dangerous convoys moving throughout the world. We have a wide variety of enemies that you fight. We have what’s called low-tier grunts, the basic enemies you fight, and that goes up through what we call tier ones, tier twos, tier threes. Then we have dangerous lieutenants that are even scarier, and then on top of that, we have roaming commanders, which are the hardest enemies you’ll fight, and they come in the form of heavy tanks, agile helicopters, drone swarms, seven foot tall juggernauts, and more.”
Dynamic weather is also part of that equation. Conditions can vary between deployments and shift during a match, with rain, fog, snow, and storms changing visibility and traversal across Hajin.
“And you saw a bit of our dynamic weather system in the trailer… We have this goal that every deployment feel different, and the weather system helps with that as well. So, you go in sometimes it’s sunny, sometimes it’s a bit foggy, you go in, it’s sprinkling, raining, eventually we have snow, and there’s a gradation to all of this. It’s not always severe. It varies. We mix and match these, and we’re also pushing to have it so as the match progresses, there’s a good chance that as the deployment is nearing its end, the weather starts to intensify to further make you feel like you need to get out.”
Modern Warfare 4’s DMZ Has A GTA-Style Wanted System For AI
Hajin becomes increasingly dangerous as players become more aggressive, but there’s a way to control and avoid this.
“We have a new star system in DMZ. So, as you raise your star level by going loud and killing AI in the area, your star level increases, and harder AI come after you. Eventually, in the trailer, you saw the helicopter that came in with the RPGs. Those AI will chase you down, vehicles will chase you down, and eventually you just, you have to say, ‘I just need to get out of here if I want to survive.'”
The system works alongside a new stealth framework designed to give players more control over engagements.
“In this DMZ, as soon as you step out, there’ll be an indicator that says, like, ‘hey, an AI is about to spot you,’ you can hit the deck, cancel that, control the pace of combat, you can suppress kill enemies, and those don’t count towards your star system. That allows you to control the world, control the combat, and protect yourself.”
In my interviews, the developers confirmed that the star system goes up to six, as as you increase your star raiting, the types of enemies and the tier level of enemies increases, making it very difficult to extract once you’ve maxed that out. “People have done it. It’s just hard,” Smith tells me, laughing. “There’s like a chopper with some angry dudes and they’re shooting rockets at you.”
Once you break the knob, you can’t fix it and the AI won’t stop.
DMZ Does Support Solo Play
DMZ is cleary designed to be a squad-focused mode built around three-player teams, but Infinity Ward also spent time discussing solo players during the interview, and some of the systems originated from the desire for solo play. Jack Hoppus, Technical Designer, tells me:
“If you’re the solo player that wants to live out your stealth mission, you could totally do a huge variety of the content in DMZ, completely stealth. And we have tools that make getting downed less painful, like, we have the tourniquet, which will get you back up, but with less max health. We play a bunch of these extraction shooters, we play a bunch of games solo as well, so we’re we’re aimed at ‘what’s the best experience for a solo player?’ So we’re also looking at it from that lens, what are pain points and how can we iron those out.”
Using suppressors, we’re told, seems to be the primary way to minimize AI attention. And when solo, systems like the tourniquet help soften the punishment of getting downed while operating alone.
The Layers of DMZ Progression Explained
DMZ introduces its own progression structure built around DMZ Rank, Traits, Active Duty Operators, and the Forward Operating Base.
“DMZ is a game within a game, it’s a fully featured extraction shooter, so DMZ has its own approachable dedicated progression track, so as you’re playing DMZ, you’re earning experience, whether you’re killing AI, killing players, killing lieutenants, et cetera, working on dynamic ops, you’re always earning experience, and that experience unlocks new features in DMZ.”
Each operator you build out can specialize in different roles, and they don’t share gear or traits.
“Each of those operators can represent a different play style. If you have an operator that’s your PVP operator, your operator that’s your PVE operator, the operator that’s really good at looting. Each of them can have a different trait tree.”
Infinity Ward also introduced an MIA system that allows players to rescue fallen operators.
“If you go in, you earn a bunch of experience with an operator, and then you die, come back out, you can spend cash in game cash to send in the evac team, rescue that operator, and then instantly you can spend that experience, those experience points on traits and go back in with that operator, but the catch is the higher you level that operator, the more expensive it is to rescue them.”
Crafting, Printing, And The Forward Operating Base
Between deployments, players return to a Forward Operating Base that expands as their DMZ Rank increases. Think of it like unlocking and leveling up workbenches in ARC Raiders.
“We have our forward operating base, so in between each deployment into the exclusion zone, you and your squad come back to your forward operating base, and as you increase your DMZ rank, you will unlock new stations, new functionality in DMZ. Visually, your FOB will upgrade. You’ll unlock the 3D printer, the vendor, the gunsmith, and much more.”
Loot collected throughout Hajin feeds directly into the crafting system.
“And in order to have a meaningful looting experience. We need to have you care about what you’re finding in loot. Finding good gear is pretty straightforward, finding a better plate carrier, finding a bigger backpack, finding a kill streak. But throughout Hajin, throughout the containers in the world, you’re going to find materials and unique printer ingredients that allow you to use our 3D printer to craft gear, and this is to help you get your load out back up, or to improve your power in DMZ.”
Players can print crafted items directly to an active operator or store them in a dedicated stash. Each active-duty operator maintains their own backpack and loadout inventory, allowing separate progression paths across multiple characters.
PvP in DMZ Has Obvious Consequences (And Some Cool Added Layers)
PvP remains a major part of DMZ’s identity. This is Call of Duty, after all. But if you’re hardcore focused on this, there are some new systems that will paint a target on your back.
“PVP is our bread and butter. It’s really important. We wanted to make sure that PVP was as rewarding as it could be. So, we developed a new bounty system.”
That bounty system tracks players who repeatedly hunt other operators.
“The way that this works is, as you go in, if you’re going to the match and you’re killing other players – not in self-defense, you’re actually going after and killing other players – you start to develop a reputation behind the scenes. Kill enough players and eventually a bounty will automatically be put on your head. And if someone kills you and they pick up your dog tag, they’re going to see that that dog tag has a bounty and they can extract that to get that reward.”
The system escalates into Wanted status.
“You keep killing players and you keep leveling up that bounty, eventually you cross into the Wanted status. What that means is that other players in the match who want to be bounty hunters can pay intel. They pull out their tablet and they say, ‘Okay, I’m going to pay for intel on this wanted player,’ get their location, and go hunt them down.”
Infinity Ward is also building leaderboards around bounty hunting and PvP performance, including both global rankings and friends-only competition.
DMZ Feels Much Closer To A Standalone Extraction Shooter
During my follow-up interview, Smith revealed that Infinity Ward’s interest in extraction shooters predates Warzone itself, so it’s become a full circle moment for the studio and the shooter genre.
“We prototyped DMZ before Warzone. We had a little mode called Escape, and you know, if you shoot your shoot the other players, they’d spit out like all these coins, like you had to get from one section to another, and just, you know, everybody, the studio wasn’t ready yet, so we had to cook that a little longer. So this has been a passion project, of kind of reading the tea leaves, and you know, seeing where kind of the mind is going.”
- Released
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October 23, 2026
- Developer(s)
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Infinity Ward
- Multiplayer
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Online Multiplayer, Online Co-Op
- Franchise
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Call of Duty
- Number of Players
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1-60 players