One of the downsides to Call of Duty's annual release schedule is that people get excited about the next instalment in the behemoth franchise less than a year after the previous one has come out. It leaves little of the spotlight for each title to grow at a healthy pace, as the rate at which new follow-ups takeover the hot seat is so snappy.
Case in point: everyone's talking about Call of Duty: Black Ops 4, especially after its trailer for this weekend's multiplayer beta features snippets of gameplay for Blackout (the hotly anticipated Battle Royale mode). Meanwhile, Call of Duty WW2, Sledgehammer's latest take on the series from last year, is making a noble, albeit comparatively unnoticed effort to tide its community over until October, when the Black Ops sequel releases.
Days of Summer, a free, summer event for all owners of Call of Duty: WW2, runs from now until August 28, and adds a bunch of new, decidedly non-historic content into the multiplayer and Nazi Zombies portions of the first-person shooter.
First up, a new map, Sandbox, is literally what it sounds like, but maybe not in the way that you think. Timed nicely alongside the release of Ant-Man and the Wasp, everyone's the size of a toy soldier in this miniaturised warzone, which will be available first on PlayStation 4 (Activision hasn't specified when the map will arrive on PC and Xbox One).
Call of Duty WW2's Dogfighting mode, previously locked to owners of The War Machine DLC pack, will also be unlocked to all players for the duration of Days of Summer, allowing anyone to try out the game's aerial combat PvP, free of charge.
On top of this, there are three new weapons to try out in multiplayer, including the Ribeyrolles submachine gun, Automaton sniper rifle, and 3-Line Rifle; a deadly one-shot powerhouse of a long-range firearm. Days of Summer also brings new updates to Call of Duty WW2's progression system, and throws beach-themed undead enemies into the game's Nazi Zombies co-op horde mode.
Anyone can enjoy all the features of the Days of Summer event by downloading the update and logging into Call of Duty: WW2 between now and August 28. Given that Black Ops 4 is releasing on October 12, this is likely the last big news you'll hear from Sledgehammer until its next Call of Duty game arrives in 2020, so now's a good time to press F to pay your respects and say goodbye to WW2 for good.
There's also a bunch of other best FPS games to try out this summer, so discover which ones you might be missing out on.
