While many Call of Duty fans have been glad to see old maps return to the franchise, OpTic Chicago's Scump is calling for a change. While fans do enjoy the old maps, it has been some time since a new map was added to the game.
With Call of Duty catering to both Call of Duty: Warzone and Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War, development time is spent on other factors than the creation of new environments.
Call of Duty has entered Stage 3 of the 2021 CDL events, and since then, two classic maps have been added. Raid and Express are both popular Call of Duty maps, but they come from a previous title. Following the update for Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War Season 3, the only new map that may appear in competitive is the vintage map Standoff.
In an episode of the OpTic podcast, Scump and content creator Davis "Hitch" Edwards discussed maps as one of their topics. In this discussion, Scump calls for the developers to stop relying on older content, and instead, they should be innovating map design standards. This is provoked due to recent maps Raid, Express, and Standoff all come from Call of Duty: Black Ops 2. The main issue is not the old maps but the lack of good original maps in the competitive environment. Many of the pros have spent countless hours in the old maps, and while they are good, the players might as well be playing older titles.
Hitch presented a counterargument pointing out the difficulty in creating maps that are "guaranteed good." He reflects upon recent history, with many of the newer maps having mixed reception. Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War launched into a world of complaints as Miami was too big and other maps were too bugged to be considered "good."
While Scump seemed to agree with Hitch, he does point out that there are good maps, just not memorable ones. Much of the newer content seems to be designed with classic routes, and Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War's competitive audience wants more than standards.
While there is no telling if the developers will generate a "prestigious" map, the next title is highly anticipated by the community. Call of Duty will continue to evolve as time goes on, and eventually, there may be another set of maps worthy of fan and competitor attention.