Call of Duty Zombies was Inspired by an Unlikely 2D Top-Down Space Shooter Born from a Mini-Game in a Forgettable DC Racer

One of Call of Duty‘s most-loved game modes, Zombies, is one players have seen time and again but can’t get enough of. It’s a staple in the franchise’s many entries, and if you were wondering how it even found a place in the games, look no further.

Jesse Snyder, the creator of the famous mode, has shared how the popular mode came to be. Having been a designer for the franchise for a long time, he held the vision and passion to take it to the next level.

The story of how the game mode came to be was revealed on Snyder’s website. It starts with Dan Bunting, a producer, approaching Snyder with queries on adding extra content to Call of Duty: World at War. Earlier in the development cycle, the team had formulated a concept where you play as a German soldier who faces off waves of Allied soldiers.

Eventually, you’d get overwhelmed by the sheer number of enemies, and by the end, you’d be executed by an American soldier. However, there was a lot of resistance against playing as a German, and the idea was canned. Snyder was still hung on the idea of “being overrun and not being able to win.”

He asked Bunting if he’d played a Tower Defense game, where you survive waves of enemies, earn points from kills, and use that to upgrade your base to survive the next round until you eventually die. Snyder felt this mode could be done easily. He had an idea in mind:

The model for the extra content I really wanted to follow was that of Geometry Wars.

The game originally started as a mini-game in Project Gotham Racing 2 and grew popular enough to be completely separate. The model gives players highly replayable content while allowing developers to test new ideas.

As Synder sat on the idea, a team member suggested he play The Last Stand, where you play as a survivor fending off zombies. After playing a few rounds, Synder had an Eureka moment. Why not implement a similar mode in World at War, but with Nazi zombies?

Ideas rushed through Synder, and while ideas eventually turned into a franchise staple that continues to be included in newer entries, it wasn’t an immediate success.

Bunting didn’t buy into the idea, but other team members were on board. Bunting instead began prototyping a tower defense game that was “missing all the fundamentals,” according to Snyder. After months of asking, Synder grew frustrated and singlehandedly prototyped the game over a weekend.

When he showed it to people, the initial reaction was a hit, and its potential was recognized. The project eventually got greenlit while Bunting’s was cut, and after a lot of back and forth, the Zombies game mode was born.

Have you played Call of Duty‘s Zombies mode? Let us know what you think about it in the comments below!