John F. Kennedy pictured in a teaser for the next Call of Duty game.

Activision teases Call of Duty: 2020 in a basement in Warzone

Activision has teased its Call of Duty 2020 game, believed to be Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War, in the Call of Duty: Warzone battle royale spinoff.

The publisher hasn’t revealed it yet, but Doritos accidentally leaked information and the title about the next game, corroborating others that point to a 1960s Cold War setting, similar to 2010’s Call of Duty: Black Ops. In case you haven’t heard about it before, this feels like an alternate reality game (ARG) to me, leading to Activision’s official reveal. It’s a treasure hunt for the most dedicated fans.

Onlookers expect the official reveal day will be August 19.

If you head to pawntakespawn.com/tv (a website Activision’s previous bread crumbs led fans to), you can see a TV set from the time when I was a kid, as well as a video cassette recorder, a phone modem, a chess piece, and an old computer. When you click on the videotape with 1961-62 on it, you see some footage of President John F. Kennedy as well as scenes from the space race, the Civil Rights movement, and the Cuban Missile Crisis.

A Call of Duty 2020 revelation clue.

The video flashes numbers on the screen, including 37, 25, and 48. You’ll also see “WZ-H6-49285 163.” @CharlieINTEL on Twitter followed these developing teases closely, discovering that the H6 in the above code was a reference to the Farmland location in Call of Duty: Warzone. Players used the code on the door in a house, and it led to a room with more clues.

The door opens to a secret room with more clues. There’s another code with /TANGLEDWEB and /EMC2 written on it. You can go back to the pawntakespawn.com/tangledweb link and pawntakespawn.com/emc2 for more clues. The first link leads to a note that ends with “know your history.” The second one suggests something else will happen tomorrow.

Dean Takahashi

Dean Takahashi is editorial director for GamesBeat at VentureBeat. He has been a tech journalist since 1988, and he has covered games as a beat since 1996. He was lead writer for GamesBeat at VentureBeat from 2008 to April 2025. Prior to that, he wrote for the San Jose Mercury News, the Red Herring, the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, and the Dallas Times-Herald. He is the author of two books, "Opening the Xbox" and "The Xbox 360 Uncloaked." He organizes the annual GamesBeat Next, GamesBeat Summit and GamesBeat Insider Series: Hollywood and Games conferences and is a frequent speaker at gaming and tech events. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.