Call of Duty: Warzone‘s smaller Rebirth Island map has remained mostly unchanged since it was added with Black Ops Cold War’s first season of content in December 2020, but Activision has repeatedly hinted at future map changes. Here’s what we know so far and some speculation on what the changes could mean for Warzone’s future narrative.
Rebirth Island teases
Previously, with the official announcement of Season 2’s content, Activision vaguely mentioned map changes and that some sort of reinforcements would be added to Rebirth Island. “As Caldera’s secrets come to light, something lurks within Rebirth Island’s shadows”, the blog post said. “Expect substantial changes to the prison island during the midseason update…”
The tease doesn’t really give anything away, but the narrative seems to now tie Rebirth Island to Caldera, continuing to focus on the Nebula V gas that was introduced for Season 2’s launch. Caldera added underground bunkers and a Chemical Factory location that produces the Nebula V gas, and now it seems Rebirth Island is also going to add elements related to the gas, as Activision’s blog tease included a photo of a building’s interior with large cylinders containing what looks very similar to Nebula V gas. There’s no way to tell if this is going to be a brand-new building on Rebirth Island, or if an existing building on the island is getting a makeover.
Additionally, Warzone’s Iron Trials mode was added to Rebirth Island on March 3. Activision’s announcement of Rebirth Iron Trials noted that this would be the final mode for the current Rebirth Island, saying it should be considered as an encore for this Cold War version of the map. Activision dropped another interesting hint in the blog by saying, “Although it is not the end for Rebirth Island, you may want to drop back in before a familiar foe brings the largest updates to this map since its release…”
Warzone’s familiar foe
Activision teasing story elements hopefully means we’ll get a cinematic trailer just as we have in the past, but it’s uncertain who the familiar foe might be. If this is truly closing out the Black Ops Cold War era for the island, it’s possible the character is going to be Stitch. Stitch was the antagonist for Treyarch’s Cold War narrative, but he was presumed to be killed by Alder with the Season 6 outro cutscene. However, he might not be dead after all. The cutscene only fades to black at the end with the sound of a gunshot. And just like in the movies, if you didn’t see the bad guy die, they probably didn’t bite the dust after all.
The cutscene also gave us a vague villain-y speech from Stitch, where he tells Alder his Numbers broadcast plan was complete and that he changed the world, but the effects of his plan are unknown to us. Maybe the upcoming narrative will answer those questions left from the Cold War era before sending us back to what is likely a Vanguard-themed version of Rebirth Island with Nebula V gas.
There’s also a chance that the threat coming to Rebirth Island isn’t from Black Ops Cold War at all. The Call of Duty storyline is getting complex with all the different titles being woven together for a shared universe. Vanguard’s Captain Butcher is alive in the ’80s, telling the stories of World War II and Caldera to Mason, Woods, and Hudson from Black Ops Cold War. This updated map event could provide a chance to integrate more characters from the Modern Warfare series into the timeline. I don’t how the Modern Warfare characters could integrate and still bring us into a World War II era map, but anything is possible in Call of Duty at this point.
Infinity Ward’s sequel to 2019’s Modern Warfare has already been announced, so there’s a possibility that Activision plans to use Warzone to introduce some new narrative from the series to build up to the release of this year’s Modern Warfare 2. So, that leaves the question of which Modern Warfare foe could potentially arrive to Rebirth Island.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare’s campaign narrative continued to unfold post-launch in Spec Ops mode and inside of Warzone, which showed Captain Price assembling the iconic Task Force 141 to fight against a new threat in Verdansk. This information is revealed over time to be the antagonist duo of Khaled Al-Asad and Victor Zakhaev.
Modern Warfare’s final cutscene within Warzone ends with Captain Price killing Zakhaev, who was preparing to detonate a nuclear bomb under Verdansk, but the fate and whereabouts of Al-Asad are unknown. This makes Al-Asad a foe who could easily resurface in Warzone.
Campaign details of Modern Warfare 2’s sequel haven’t been officially revealed, although it’s rumored to be focused on Colombian drug cartels. It’s unclear how that rumored theme would tie into the previous story, but it would be nice to have a continuation of the narrative built from Modern Warfare’s post-launch content.
When to expect the change
All speculation aside, we likely won’t know who will show up or what Rebirth Island will actually look like until much closer to the change happens. This visual overhaul is scheduled to take place sometime within Season 2’s mid-season update, which should be sometime near the end of March. Season 2’s roadmap for Warzone also announced something called Rebirth Reinforced, which could be the name of the new map variant, some sort of special event, or a limited-time mode coming later in the season. Based on the image of Rebirth Island used in the roadmap for Rebirth Reinforced, the island shouldn’t change too drastically, but a themed makeover could be a nice refresh for the map.
Warzone recently introduced a new Easter egg on Caldera, which teases a battleship could be arriving to Warzone’s main map. So whether players prefer Caldera or Rebirth Island, there seems to be some interesting updates on the horizon for Call of Duty’s battle royale.
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