Call of Duty: Black Ops III’s designers on underwater guns and MOBA-like play (interview, part 3)

You can’t really shoot guns underwater. But if you could, it would really be fun. That’s why you’ll be able to maneuver underwater and fire your weapons while swimming in Call of Duty: Black Ops III. And who knows? Maybe by the year 2060, we will be able to shoot guns underwater.

I talked to Treyarch’s leaders about this design decision and other changes they made in Black Ops III. The next installment in the multibillion-dollar video game franchise is being built by a team of hundreds at Activision’s Treyarch studio in Santa Monica, Calif. By the this triple-A release ships on Nov. 6, Treyarch will have worked on it for three years, a year longer than the usual Call of Duty game. Activision now has three studios trading off the duty, including Treyarch, Infinity Ward, and Sledgehammer Games.