It would appear that the rumours are finally over concerning Activision’s popular Call of Duty 4 and a possible transitional move away from the relative FPS genre safety previously provided by the seemingly inexhaustible World War II conflict.

More pointedly, third-party publishing giant Activision has this week officially revealed (somewhat vaguely) that the next instalment of its first-person shooter stalwart, Call of Duty, will arrive in a more modernistic setting.

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare will apparently abandon Activision’s established WWII reliance and instead focus on creating a more original and contemporary storyline and conflict. The new game will be developed by series specialists Infinity Ward (Call of Duty, Call of Duty 2) and will follow the path first trodden by Electronic Arts’ Battlefield franchise, which has already made the move from the World War genre onto a modern and then futuristic canvas with Battlefield 2: Modern Combat and Battlefield 2142.

And this is where the aforementioned ‘vague’ undertow grabs onto the wispy tendrils of brief information before dragging Call of Duty 4 off into the blackness of the developmental deep. Beyond its shift in timeline, nothing is presently known about Infinity Ward’s latest FPS offering, apart from that a trailer for the game will be broadcast during tomorrow’s (Sat 28) NFL Draft on ESPN (10am PDT and 1pm EDT). We’d expect an official press release with further tantalising game aspects to land soon after.