COD’s worst villain to return in MW2, datamine leak suggests
A datamine leak has hinted at the return of General Shepherd to the Call of Duty series. Shepherd is the 2009 CoD: Modern Warfare 2’s main villain and the most hated character of the franchise.
The new COD: MW 2 wrapped its second Beta weekend on September 26. Despite players complaining of the game’s multiplayer problematic minimap, cheaters and meta field upgrade on Dead Silence, fans are looking forward to its October 28 release.
Activision earlier confirmed that the original COD: MW 2 characters would return in the most-awaited reboot of the game. Notable characters like Price, Soap, Gaz, and Ghost will have another run in the sequel. Tagging along is Shepherd, whose return was confirmed after 16 codename missions of the game were leaked, with one of them being named Backstabbed.
The mission’s codename hints at Shepherd’s appearance in the reboot. In the original game, there is a campaign mission called Loose Ends, in which Shepherd betrays Ghost and Roach. Shepherd kills them as Price warns them of the betrayal via the radio.
More on datamine leak
As mentioned above, there were 16 codenames of campaign missions leaked by dataminers sometime last week. Other than Backstabbed, the missions are Border, Convoy Chase, Gunship, Intercept, Marina, Montage, Nightwar, Party, Prison, Shadowbase, ShipAF, Stolen, Strike, Tower and Wounded.
Shepherd is widely considered the worst villain of the series, mainly because he kills Ghost, the most-beloved character in the MW series. The new datamine leak showed that Backstabbed is set in Mexico, where Ghost might face the same fate as in the mission Loose Ends.
Loose Ends is the 15th mission of the 2009 game. There, players play Roach to infiltrate and kill Makarov, another famous villain of the series, at his safehouse deep in the Caucasus Mountains.
After clearing out Makarov’s men, it is revealed that he is nowhere to be found. The only clue of his whereabouts is left in a DSM. Shortly after, the team is ambushed and forced to retreat. Shepherd and his men arrive at the extraction point, take over the DSM and perform a betrayal that lasts for years in the memory of fans.
It remains to be seen whether the new COD: MW 2 has the same storyline as the 2009 version. Activision and Infinity Ward made several changes in the 2019 reboot of the prequel game, including the storyline, characters, and missions. What is certain, however, is that the campaign in COD: MW 2 will offer new gameplay variations.
“This Campaign is set to be an incredible experience on numerous levels: offshore sieges with underwater combat, all-out explosive assaults from 30,000 feet above enemy strongholds, and high-stakes, low-profile stealth missions in both plain sight and under the cover of darkness,” Activision wrote.
Co-created by multiple developers, including Infinity Ward, Treyarch, Demonware, and Activision Shanghai, COD: MW 2 will be available on Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, and Microsoft Windows.
Players who pre-order the digital version of the game will be able to play it earlier, starting October 20.
A few weeks after COD: MW 2’s worldwide release, Warzone 2.0, a massive battle royale version of the game, will launch on November 16 as MW 2’s Season One.
