Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 pays tribute to late COD co-creator and Infinity Ward co-founder Vince Zampella

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 pays tribute to Vince Zampella in its credits.

As noted on X by Geoff Keighley, the game’s credits include a separate screen dedicated to the late game designer, which simply says: “In memoriam – Vince Zampella.”

Zampella – who had been put in charge of the struggling Battlefield series and led its comeback with Battlefield 6 – died in a car crash in December 2025, two months after the game’s release.

Although he hadn’t been involved in the Call of Duty series for more than a decade and a half, Zampella was instrumental in not only the creation of Call of Duty itself, but also Modern Warfare 4 studio Infinity Ward.

Zampella started his career as a graphic designer in the 90s, eventually working for the likes of Atari and Sega, but his big break came when he was the lead designer of the critically acclaimed Electronic Arts first-person shooter, Medal of Honor: Allied Assault.

After its release, Zampella co-founded Infinity Ward with Grant Collier and Jason West, and signed a publishing agreement with Activision with the aim of creating a first-person shooter that would surpass the Medal of Honor series.

The result was the blockbuster Call of Duty franchise, and Zampella would continue to lead Infinity Ward as the studio released numerous entries in the series, up to Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 in 2009.

Zampella’s relationship with the series would last less than a decade, however, and following a high-profile dispute with Activision, which saw Zampella and West fired and denied bonuses for Modern Warfare 2, they formed Respawn Entertainment in 2010.

The studio would go on to release Titanfall, Titanfall 2, Apex Legends, and Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order with their former publisher, Electronic Arts.

Respawn was acquired by EA in 2017, and Zampella took on leadership of another EA-owned studio, the LA arm of DICE, in 2020, before being chosen to oversee the Battlefield series in 2021, following the disappointing release of Battlefield 2042.

The result of Zampella’s leadership was Battlefield 6, which released earlier this year and sold over 7 million copies in its first three days, making it the biggest launch in the series’ history.

His part in the creation of both Call of Duty and Infinity Ward – as well as his influence on the modern first-person shooter genre as a whole – is clear, however, hence his dedication in Modern Warfare 4.