Author: Nik Ranger

Call of Duty League reveals new $250,000 Challengers Cups online events Infinity WardActivision Blizzard has bolstered its support of the Call of Duty Challengers scene as brand new Challengers Cups have been revealed with $250,000 to compete for. As the Call of Duty League has transitioned to online play, so too has its amateur counterpart in Challengers. Divided into three regions, a new digital format will give players in Europe, North America, and Asia-Pacific (APAC), some fresh competition. A combined prize pool of $250,000 is on the line, with action kicking off on April 18. Here’s a full rundown on everything you need to know about the brand new Challengers Cups. Amateur Call of Duty teams were able to compete in five LAN Challengers events throughout the first three months of the year. However, as CDL switched to an online format, the amateur scene was left hanging for a number of weeks. Their fears have been put to rest though, with Challenger Cups being added to the tournament circuit. The five online tournaments, spanning across three regions, will give tier-two players access to a combined prize pool of $250,000 USD. Read More: CDL Dallas Day 2 recap & highlights – Split across Europe, North America, and Asia-Pacific, these events serve as an online alternative to keep the amateur scene moving forward in 2020 with fresh competitions. https://twitter.com/CODLeague/status/1249484170486673409 The first Challengers Cup will take place on April 18. $5,000 will be on the line for APAC, $20,000 for Europe, and $25,000 for North America. Players will also earn Challengers Points for their efforts in the new tournaments. The top team will earn 5,000 points per player. However, what these points turn into at the end of the year is yet to be revealed. Events continue throughout each region every fortnight with the same prize pools until five Cups come to an end. CDL’s Jack Felling also hinted that Challengers will receive a dedicated broadcast on Sundays. ⬆️ 📢 Let’s goooo, we’re back! 📢 ⚡️Fri/Sat/Sun #CallofDutyLeague Pro Broadcasts 💰 5 New $50,000 Challengers Cups (Deeper prizing, DEDICATED broadcast on Sundays) 🎮 $15,000 Challengers Team Opens online tourneys on same corresponding pro team wknds ✈️ City Circuit (2v2) too— JackieFelling (@JackFellingX) April 6, 2020 With an extra $250,000 now up for grabs, there’s plenty for Challengers players to fight for. These cups aren’t going to be replacing CDL online opens, which run every week there’s tier-one games on. You can register for the tournaments right now by clicking on the link to your respective region in the full Challengers schedule.

Call of Duty League 2025 rostermania tracker: All team leaks & rumors ActivisionWith the Esports World Cup officially in the rearview mirror, CDL Rostermania 2025 has formally started. After disappointing seasons for several organizations, don’t be surprised to see a few teams reshuffle their decks. Instead of the offseason starting after CDL Champs like most seasons, that date got pushed back because of the first-ever Esports World Cup. Last Rostermania, Drazah joined FaZe, Kenny went to OpTic, and Sib replaced Priestahh, stealing the show of the offseason. Toronto kicked off the window with a surprising move, and we expect a series of other decisions as organizations attempt to compete more with a stacked top-four group of talent. Let’s jump right into what fans can expect. Contents CDL Rostermania ahead of Black Ops 6 – Call of Duty League teams & rosters – CDL rostermania changes and rumors – CDL Rostermania ahead of Black Ops 6 Free agency officially started on Aug. 19, 2024, meaning organizations can negotiate with players and sign new contracts. The 2024 CDL season began on Dec. 8, 2023. Activision has yet to confirm when the next season will start. However, fans can expect a significant amount of roster turnover over the next few months, regardless of when the first stage of Black Ops 6 online qualifiers kicks off. Teams & rosters All changes and rumors So far, here are the reports of what organizations have planned for new rosters. Aug 19: Minnesota RØKKR drop Accuracy – Insight announces departure from Toronto Ultra – Carolina Royal Ravens release Beans and TJHaLy – Vegas Legion drop Fame – Aug 20: Vegas Legion drop Gio and Nero – Estreal confirms departure from Minnesota RØKKR – Falcons Esports takes over the Vegas CDL slot and announces a roster of Exnid, Roxas, Khhx, and KingAbody – Aug 23: Miami Heretics sign RenKoR – FeLo announces he is a restricted free agent for the upcoming season. – Aug 28:

Call of Duty League 2023 schedule potentially leaked with December start Call of Duty LeagueInternal Call of Duty League documents obtained by Dexerto appear to show the full CDL 2023 schedule, with an earlier start date than previous seasons, five Major tournaments, and an earlier date for the Call of Duty Championship event. Since launching the Call of Duty League in 2020, Activision have been working towards refining the schedule and format of the season. In 2020, the Home Series formula was interrupted by the global health situation, but in 2021 and 2022, they started to opt for online qualifier matches to build towards the Majors, team-hosted LAN events for each franchise to show how far along they had come. That said, fans and players alike have frequently suggested ways to improve the schedule, including an earlier start date, tournaments for Challengers players to face off against the pros, and more. According to these leaked documents, fans’ prayers may have been answered. Here are the key tournaments in the schedule, according to the above document: Major 1 Pro-Am: December 15-18 (League hosted) – Major 2: February 2-5 (Team hosted) – Major 3: March 9-12 (Team hosted) – Major 4: April 20-23 (Team hosted) – Major 5: May 25-28 (Team hosted) – CDL Champs: June 15-18 (League hosted) – It’s worth noting that each Major features three weekends of qualifying matches leading up to it, with the exception of the Major 1 Pro-Am, which only has two. This would mean the first week of Call of Duty League 2023 qualifier matches will take place from December 2-4. While this schedule has been confirmed by Dexerto sources, it’s worth noting that dates and the schedule itself are subject to change. With teams looking ahead to the launch of the highly-anticipated Modern Warfare 2, you can keep up with all of the official CDL roster moves in our rostermania hub. The Call of Duty League provided the following comment: “We have been working closely with our teams to finalize the 2023 season schedule, exploring several draft options these last few months. A full season reveal is planned for this fall with more information on dates and locations for each event.”

Call of Duty League 2023 preseason power rankings Call of Duty LeagueThe 2023 Call of Duty League season is right around the corner, with the 12 best teams in CoD getting their championship-winning hopes underway. But how do the teams fare ahead of the season launch? Here are our preseason power rankings. On a completely new game, it’s hard to tell where exactly teams stand against one another. Of course, we can take a look at scrim results to get a lay of the land but, ultimately, it’s just practice, and one good scrim performance doesn’t make a team the best in the game. With no competitive matches yet having taken place, we instead must look at the rosters formed and the teams’ forms at the tail end of the 2022 season, as well as the sentiment from their fellow competitors in the early days of Modern Warfare II. So, here’s how our power rankings look before the action officially gets underway. CDL Power Rankings 2023 12. London Royal Ravens London’s rag-tag mix of players has been brought together for the Modern Warfare 2 season, bringing back Zer0 and Nastie and signing Asim and PaulEhx to join them. While both are very capable players, there still feels like a lack of real firepower on this London squad, and based on some of the comments made by their competition in recent weeks, they’re not exactly fighting for championships this early in the year. 11. Florida Mutineers Following the culmination of their 2022 season, the Mutineers dropped both of their superstar AR players, with Skyz making his way to New York Subliners while Owakening joined Boston Breach, in a move that raised some eyebrows. To replace them, Florida brought in two Challengers stars in Brack and Vikul, but expectations aren’t exactly high for them to replicate similar performances as the players they’ve succeeded. 10. LA Guerrillas LA Guerrillas have become known as the “money team” in the CDL, not afraid to splash the cash to get the players they want. After failing to qualify for Champs 2022, they brought in Toronto Ultra coaches MarkyB and Mayhem, as well as allegedly paying one of the biggest buyouts in CoD history to pick up Arcitys as their main AR. That said, the core of their team is still the same one that failed to follow up their Major 2 win with any kind of success, and there are some clear question marks over what to expect from this quartet. 9. Vegas Legion According to the latest polls and opinions from their opponents, Vegas Legion could be a genuine threat this season, despite pulling together what has been seen by many as a somewhat random roster. That said, it’s still worth tempering our expectations until we see this team in action. They’ve historically been one of the worst teams in the CDL, and moving to Vegas won’t let them lose that tag so easily. The team needs to come out swinging, despite having one of the toughest Major 1 qualifier schedules in the league. 8. New York Subliners New York Subliners had a miserable 2022 season, with the defining, shining moment being their runners-up medals at Major 4 securing them a last-minute entry to CDL Champs. With the loss of Crimsix and PaulEhx, New York picked up Skyz and Priestahh, who can almost certainly be considered upgrades overall, especially if they play to their potential. 7. Boston Breach Boston Breach were on a great trajectory at the tail end of the 2022 season, and if not for an unfortunate meeting with eventual champions LA Thieves in the first round of Champs, may well have made a run in the tournament. While we didn’t get to witness that possibility become a reality, Boston have upgraded in 2023, bringing in Owakening to replace TJHaly, an immediate boost in slaying ability. How exactly this works out for them in MW2, however, is anyone’s guess. 6. Minnesota Røkkr Minnesota Røkkr have sought out the help of some of Europe’s top stars to increase their title hopes in 2023, bringing in Bance, Cammy, and Afro to join Attach, who had one of his best seasons in his career so far in Vanguard. Minnesota certainly have the potential to be challenging for championships, but at this point in time, there are several teams who could fit that bill. 5. Toronto Ultra Toronto let Bance and Cammy go to Minnesota in the off-season, bringing in Standy and Challengers star Scrappy as their replacements. The swap is fairly like-for-like, and it’s impossible to tell at this point in time which team came out better for it, but during preseason scrims, there’s a lot of hype around this Toronto Ultra side. 4. OpTic Texas OpTic Texas, conversely, aren’t getting a lot of hype ahead of the season starting. That said, and as mentioned before, it’s only scrims, and we also have to look at the bigger picture here. They placed top 4 at Champs 2022, and as we all know by now: OpTic start their seasons strong. Combine that with one of the most naturally talented rosters in the league, and it’s hard to imagine OpTic being a truly mid-table side. 3. Seattle Surge Seattle’s spot here in third feels like the most down to chance, especially as the mid-table teams can be judged so closely. If Sib and Pred continue their reign of dominance in Modern Warfare II, then third will definitely feel more than fair, especially considering how well they performed at the tail end of the 2022 season. Fortunately, their Major 1 qualifiers schedule is expected to be on the easier side, so they could find momentum early and really get going, starting their CDL season as they left the last. 2. Atlanta FaZe The top two spots could be interchangeable here, really, but we had to go with the known quantity in first place, hence leaving Atlanta FaZe in second. The team is going to be good: it’s almost impossible that they aren’t consistently beating top teams and challenging for chips. The only issue is that there may well be question marks around new recruit SlasheR and what he can bring to the team. The expectation is that he will be the solid main AR he’s always been and simply allow his teammates to excel, but in CoD, nothing is ever a given. 1. LA Thieves LA Thieves were the 2022 world champions, and for that reason, it was impossible to really consider moving them down. On paper, you could argue that FaZe and OpTic should be going toe-to-toe with these guys, if not even better, but between their incredible end to Vanguard and what we’ve seen so far in MW2, they have to be right there at the top. The question now is whether they can keep up their momentum and remain the best team in the game throughout this coming season. That’s it for our preseason power rankings for the CDL 2023 season, and likely the rankings that will change the most after one week as teams start to really establish themselves in the league.

Call of Duty League 2023 pre-season predictions: Champs, MVP, roster changes & more ActivisionWith the 2023 Call of Duty League season fast approaching, it’s time to predict who will be the biggest winners of the Modern Warfare 2 year, including the eventual world champions, MVP, and the Rookie of the Year. 2023 will mark the fourth season of the franchised Call of Duty League, following a decade of growth from grassroots competition to international tournaments with hundreds of thousands of viewers. With that, top pros have become stars of the gaming world, with the likes of OpTic Texas star Seth ‘Scump’ Abner being a household name among CoD players, and his fellow pro players earning salaries that many young gamers could only dream of. So, what can we expect from the upcoming Call of Duty League season? Who’s making team changes? Who’s etching their names in as champions? Which players will stand out ahead of the rest? 2023 CDL Champions: Atlanta FaZe Once again, for the third season in a row, I’m predicting Atlanta FaZe to become world champions. The players individually, and collectively, are among the best in the game’s history. With the acquisition of Austin ‘SlasheR’ Liddicoat as main AR, replacing Alec ‘Arcitys’ Sanderson, they’ve pulled in a proven veteran whose performances haven’t let up despite worse team performances in recent years. I don’t expect them to blow out the league as they did in Cold War — it will be much tighter — but it’s hard to look past FaZe as CDL Champions this coming year. CDL Major winners: OpTic Texas, Atlanta FaZe, Minnesota Røkkr, Seattle Surge This is a hard one to pick, with five Majors being played and 12 teams that could all arguably compete or cause some upsets. I don’t expect there to be one dominant team, like FaZe in Cold War, with more of a mixture of winners as happened in Vanguard. I believe Atlanta FaZe and OpTic Texas will win at least one each, but looking at the rosters, I think there’s a good chance of teams like Minnesota Røkkr and Seattle Surge proving their value in the league, too — though perhaps not as they are now (more on that later). This would be dependent on individual players catching fire, though, rather than the simple expectation of victory from FaZe and OpTic. The only glaring omission from this list is 2022 world champions LA Thieves. I have no doubt they’re going to be a strong team again, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see them winning Majors, but as proven in Vanguard with FaZe, the teams you expect to win won’t always necessarily do so. 2023 CDL MVP: Chris ‘Simp’ Lehr Alongside his team’s world championship victory, I’m expecting to see Simp top the MVP conversation once again. There are very few SMG players capable of standing to Simp 1 on 1, and as we’ve seen from the likes of him, Scump, and Amer ‘Pred’ Zulbeari over different iterations of CoD, a good SMG can really bring a team from good to great. If Simp lives up to expectations and plays as well throughout the year as he has in the early days of MW2, we could be looking at another dominant MVP season from Simp. CDL 2023 Rookie of the Year: Thomas ‘Scrappy’ Ernst This is a difficult one to choose, as there are only two true rookies in the CDL this year: Scrappy and Javier ‘Vikul’ Milagro. Even then, Scrappy did play a match for Toronto Ultra last season, so he’s got a slight leg up against pro competition. I’ve gone with Scrappy because his abilities as a flex are clearly in competition with the very best players in the game, but I expect firm competition from other players such as Elliot ‘WarDy’ Ward and Ben ‘Beans’ McMellon, who I believe will get the chance to prove themselves this year. If he does get in and gets enough time, I expect Beans especially to challenge for this accolade. Roster moves: Boston Breach, New York Subliners, Seattle Surge While there may well be more teams making roster moves in 2023, these are the sides I don’t expect to last the full season. There were rumors of Anthony ‘Methodz’ Zinni being in the firing line for Boston pre-season, and with Beans as their substitute, there’s huge potential waiting to be unleashed. Similarly, WarDy is an insanely talented player on the Subliners bench, and should Paco ‘HyDra’ Rusiewiez want another sub duo to replace Matthew ‘KiSMET’ Tinsley, this could be a straight swap. Both WarDy and Beans alike have starting roster potential (and had starting spot offers before signing for their respective sides), and teams may regret not letting them start if things go wrong. Finally, Seattle have insane players in Daunte ‘Sib’ Gray and Pred, but there were rumors that they were exploring their options for a new assault rifle player in the offseason. Lamar ‘Accuracy’ Abedi’s leadership qualities are highly regarded, but if the results aren’t there, some tough decisions could be made in the Seattle camp, and it’ll be either him or Makenzie ‘Mack’ Kelley as the names on the chopping block. All in all, we’re bound to have a good season of CDL action, regardless of whether you’re a huge Modern Warfare 2 fan or not. There’s a lot on the line for these 12 teams, and if previous years have proven anything, we should definitely expect the unexpected.

Call of Duty League 2023 power rankings before Major 1 Pro-Am Call of Duty LeagueThe first Major of the 2023 Call of Duty League season is finally here, as the 12 CDL franchises and 4 Challenger teams are set to go head-to-head for their share of the $500k prize pool. Here are the updated CDL power rankings ahead of the event. The Modern Warfare 2 season has already proven to be an eventful one, with a huge mix of results, some shock wins, drama over Gentleman’s Agreements, and more. Going into the Major, some teams have looked better than others, and with the amateur teams fighting tooth and nail to prove they deserve to be in the league, the event could be a good one. With that said, let’s take a look at the power rankings after two weeks of play. CDL power rankings after Major 1 Qualifiers (Week 2) 12. Vegas Legion(-1) Despite their victory over Minnesota Røkkr, Vegas Legion find themselves rooted to the bottom of our power rankings really through no fault of their own. The team clearly has some issues to iron out — as proven by their absolutely helpless loss to Atlanta FaZe — but there’s also more to be proud of in this team than this placement would suggest. 11. LA Guerrillas (-2) Similar to Vegas, the LA Guerrillas drop in our power rankings more due to the better performances of the team around them than anything else. With Seattle and New York both looking markedly better — including a quick 3-0 loss to the Subliners — this Guerrillas side still has some work to do to get to where they want to be. 10. Seattle Surge (-) Seattle looked a lot better in Week 2 of qualifiers than Week 1, but we’ll need to see some consistency to credit them with a complete turnaround. With Pred still looking as good as he did in 2022, the team just needs to give enough to let him fly, and they’ll be working their way back up the rankings in no time. 9. New York Subliners (+3) Subliners looked like one of the biggest beneficiaries of the removal of the M4 assault rifle from the meta, beating both Boston Breach and the LA Guerrillas. Whether this is just early success as they adapted to the new meta faster, or a legitimate fight to push up the standings, remains to be seen. 8. London Royal Ravens (-1) London have looked much better in the opening two weeks than many expected, but they failed to get a win on the board in Week 2, with losses to both Seattle and OpTic Texas. There are definitely positives to take away from it, though. While they struggled in Search & Destroy against OpTic, their respawns were looking very solid, and minor improvements could see them really push on. 7. Florida Mutineers (+1) After the Mutineers’ loss to Minnesota Røkkr, they followed it up quickly with a victory over LA Thieves. Again, Florida find themselves in a position similar to most previous seasons: able to get big victories occasionally, but not actually good enough to consistently be among the best. It’s still early days, though, and fortunes can change. 6. Minnesota Røkkr (-2) Minnesota Røkkr are indisputably a top team with a season marred early on by the SAE controversy against OpTic Texas. They’re one of several teams that have a realistic chance of taking home the trophy this weekend, but their loss to Las Vegas Legion was definitely a setback, and one they’ll want to take back to the drawing board. 5. OpTic Texas (-) OpTic are evidently one of the best teams in the game, and when the Major rolls around, they’ll definitely be one of the favorites to win the whole thing. With a loss to LA Thieves and being held very close by London Royal Ravens, however, there are definite fixes to be made ahead of their first LAN outing of the season. 4. Boston Breach (-3) Boston topped the standings after Week 1, but seem to have been held back the most with the loss of the M4. Don’t expect this to be a permanent drop-off, however, as the team clearly has a spark about them — and the Major could be a defining moment for them. 3. Atlanta FaZe (-1) Atlanta FaZe are always going to be a considerable threat, but there have been some gaps in their gameplay in the opening couple of weeks. This was highlighted in their loss to Toronto Ultra, which was kept very close, but ultimately proved that the CDL is no longer just a one- or two-horse race. 2. Toronto Ultra (+4) Toronto were heavily favored heading into the season, but with a new-look roster and uncertainty over how they would gel, it was hard to see exactly where they would fall when Majors starting rolling around. As it turns out, we’ve got a team in incredible form, each player living up to their potential, and one that could be ready to take on the biggest names in CoD to earn the organization’s first championship since April 2021. 1. LA Thieves (+2) Despite a shaky start to Major 1 qualifiers, the 2022 world champions are still the team to beat. Their victory over OpTic Texas was enough to forget about their loss to the Mutineers, and a dominant performance against London Royal Ravens in their tiebreaker match on LAN proved there’s still some serious firepower behind this squad, and they have definitely not become complacent after picking up their CDL Championship trophy. Be sure to check out our CDL Major 1 hub as we provide live updates and the latest scores from Raleigh, North Carolina.

Call of Duty League 2023/24 Major & Champs locations leaked Call of Duty League/Unsplash: Muzammil SoormaSources have revealed where exactly each Major of the 2023/24 Call of Duty League season is due to take place, with some familiar cities once again set to host the best COD players in the world. The CDL schedule always stirs up some emotions among fans and players alike, as they get to find out how exactly the season will look, the cities they might get to visit, and more. A big part of that is the LAN Majors and, more specifically, where they take place. With calls each year to bring the league to London’s passionate fanbase, or for certain franchises to get to host in their own city, there’s always a debate over where events should and shouldn’t take place. With announcements due to take place on November 2 regarding the CDL schedule, we have managed to obtain confirmation from our sources the locations for all four Majors of the season — and a huge possible Champs location. CDL Major locations 2023/24 According to our sources, here is where each Major is going to take place this season: Major 1: Boston, MA – Major 2: Miami, FL – Major 3: Toronto, ON – Major 4: Charlotte, NC – Not only that, but we have received word from multiple sources that the Call of Duty Championship is expected to take place in Dallas, Texas, in the American Airlines Center — home to the NBA’s Dallas Mavericks and NHL’s Dallas Stars. This event, however, has not been confirmed to CDL teams, so may still be subject to change. Be sure to check out our full leaked schedule for the next COD League season to find out exactly when these events are expected to take place.

Call of Duty League 2022 power rankings after Major 4 Call of Duty LeagueCDL Major IV is over, and with it, the 2022 regular season has come to an end. Following LA Thieves’ historic victory over hometown heroes New York Subliners, who qualified for Champs by the skin of their teeth, we look at the most in-form teams in our CDL power rankings. London Royal Ravens entered the tournament as the top seed, but ended up being double first rounded to drop down the standings. Meanwhile, OpTic Texas looked like they were getting back to Major 1 form in New York, a far cry from the 1-4 team they qualified as, and a huge turnaround as Champs approaches. With that in mind, here are our final rankings of the CDL 2022 season. CDL power rankings 12. Paris Legion (-) No surprises here, as Paris Legion finish the season exactly how everyone predicted. They took Atlanta FaZe to a Game 5, losing the final Berlin Search and Destroy, exactly the same as happened in their opening game of the season against FaZe too. There’s something poetic about it, but unfortunately, poetry doesn’t earn you CDL points. 11. Seattle Surge (-1) Having Seattle this far down the list feels wrong — they won Major 3, the talent on the roster is endless, and they’re not actually as bad as this number would suggest. After their Round 1 loss though, it’s hard to justify moving them up, especially as other teams around their level performed much better. 10. LA Guerrillas (-3) The Guerrillas are great at pulling out results from nowhere, such as their victories over Atlanta FaZe at both the Major 2 grand final and in Major 4 qualifiers. It’s not really reflective of their overall performance in the league, though, and is often a surprise that doesn’t lead to an upturn in form. They beat London in a 5-map matchup, but it was more reflective of just how terribly the EU side played over the weekend than any real strengths on the side of LAG. 9. Minnesota RØKKR (-) There’s definitely an argument for RØKKR to have moved down after their disappointing Major 4 performance, but ultimately they still showed promise even in their poor results. They missed out on Champs and will no doubt be disappointed, especially Attach who has been one of the best players in the game this season. 8. Boston Breach (-3) This Boston team has been constantly up and down, and many predicted a respectable placement at Major 4. Unfortunately for them, they ran into a red-hot OpTic Texas in round 2, and they looked out of their depth for much of it. They almost matched them in the Hardpoints, but ‘almost’ isn’t good enough when trying to add a notch to the wins column. 7. London Royal Ravens (-5) London looked like they were hitting final form in Major 4 qualifiers and were deemed a real threat for LAN. By the time they got to LAN, though, they weren’t anywhere close to their online form. They lost a tight match to Toronto Ultra that they arguably should have been able to close out, and followed up with another 3-2 loss to LA Guerrillas, who had not shown anywhere near London’s performance levels throughout qualifiers. They’ll have a lot to work on for Champs. 6. Florida Mutineers (-) Florida Mutineers have been a middling team for some time now, and they proved it at Major 4, finishing 5-6th after a victory over Boston and a loss to Atlanta FaZe. They failed to qualify for Champs as a result, but they did look better than the teams below them in these rankings, so it was hard to move them down, despite how far off the elite teams they are. 5. Toronto Ultra (+3) Toronto Ultra also finished with a top 6 placement, but their elimination loss to OpTic was incredibly close and boiled down to a few mistakes made on the Ultra side. They could very well have pushed for a 4th-place finish or even higher had they managed to close the series out, and while there is clear room for improvement, this team isn’t far off the top sides. 4. OpTic Texas (+7) OpTic Texas looked legitimately like one of the worst teams in the league throughout Major 4 qualifiers. They weren’t just getting unlucky with their losses, they really looked as though they were a completely different team at times. But it’s approaching Champs season and OpTic on LAN wasn’t going to let just anyone get the better of them. They fought through the loser’s bracket before ultimately losing 3-1 to FaZe. They weren’t perfect, and their wins over RØKKR and Ultra were more a testament to their SnD prowess than their dominance, but it’s a huge step in the right direction. 3. Atlanta FaZe (-) Atlanta FaZe’s period of dominance came to an end throughout Major 4, with a 3-2 qualifier record and third-place finish on LAN. That said, it’s more than likely just a bruise on their 2022 season and not a tattoo — expect them to be competing for the trophy at Champs, with anything worse deemed a failure. 2. New York Subliners (-1) Subliners came into the tournament in top form and, with the odds stacked against them, managed to get their entire tournament run almost spot-on. They won all their matches up until the grand final, when an LA Thieves team who had just come off a huge victory against Atlanta FaZe managed to put them to bed in eight maps. Make no mistake, though: with a few tweaks, they’ll no doubt still consider themselves the team to beat. 1. LA Thieves (+3) LA Thieves had a good qualifying run but almost went under the radar. Between New York and London flying, and OpTic Texas struggling like never before, it was easy to miss the improvements LA Thieves had made. Those improvements were impossible to ignore for fans and teams alike at the event, though, as they steamrolled their competition, their only loss coming to NYSL in the winner’s final. With only Champs left on the 2022 calendar, all eight teams who qualified will be putting in double-time shifts to make sure they’re more than ready for the big one. Right now, though, LA Thieves are the team that everyone will be looking to get the better of. Disclaimer: Dexerto has partnered with Misfits Gaming Group to create and package branded content across its platforms.

Call of Duty League 2022 Kickoff event viewership plummets vs 2021 Call of Duty LeagueThe Call of Duty League Kickoff Classic introduced the 2022 season, with Toronto Ultra ultimately winning the inaugural event. The victories, though, were few and far between, as viewership for the event showed a huge drop-off year-on-year. The overall sentiment towards the current CDL season was already somewhat strained heading into the Kickoff event. With pros unhappy with the state of CoD: Vanguard and players leaving to compete in other titles such as Halo, the opening tournament was going to be a good measuring stick for how the season could end up going. While the event was littered with highlight-reel plays and the dramatic action that the CDL has come to be known for, it failed to reach the lofty heights that Call of Duty has known in the past. The Kickoff Classic peaked at just short of 80,000 viewers, with an average viewership of 46,511, according to stat tracking website Esports Charts. The event was just shy of 1 million hours watched across the weekend, which would’ve been a great landmark figure to hit — but it actually represented a net drop across the board for viewership. In 2021, the kickoff event peaked at over 107,000 viewers, with an average viewership of almost 60,000. The hours watched in 2021 were only at 629k hours, but the event was also only on air for 10 hours, in comparison to 2022’s 20 hours, representing an overall drop of around 27% on average. Overall, this also means a 25% drop in peak viewership and average viewers down by around 22% in comparison to the 2021 kickoff event. While it’s difficult to ascertain exactly why this massive drop in viewership has occurred, it’s definitely something that people at the CDL will be monitoring and looking to fix when the regular season begins on February 4.

Call of Duty League 2022 All-Star teams revealed at CDL Champs Call of Duty LeagueBefore Call of Duty of Duty Champs 2022 began, The Call of Duty League revealed two All-Star teams. CoD Champs runs from August 4 to August 7 in Los Angeles. Call of Duty Vanguard’s top eight teams are going toe-to-toe for their share of $2,550,000 and a chance at winning the year’s largest tournament. Of the eight qualified teams, eight players stood out from the rest of the pack based on their performances throughout the season. Atlanta FaZe, OpTic Texas, and Seattle Surge led the way with two All-Star representatives each. Here are the full first and second teams. CDL All-Star first and second-team selections Call of Duty Vanguard was chock-full of talent from top-to-bottom of the league standings, and both all-star teams highlight that parody. The Call of Duty League revealed the all-star teams on August 4. Here is the full CDL All-Star first team. Pred: Amer ‘Pred’ Zulbeari helped lead the Seattle Surge to a Major 3 title, winning the Major 3 MVP Award. The rookie had the league’s fourth-best KD (1.09) and was a force to be reckoned with in both respawn game modes. Shotzzy: Anthony ‘Shotzzy Cuevas won the 2020 season MVP and put up another monstrous season in 2022. Shotzzy flew around maps in hardpoint, averaging over 26 kills per game. The dynamic SMG was influential in OpTic’s Major 1 victory. Dashy: The ever-reliable Brandon ‘Dashy’ Otell made his presence felt in 2022. Dashy expertly positioned himself in power positions all season long and obliterated opposing teams as the main AR. Dashy shattered record books with a 1.28 overall Control KD. Cellium: McArthur ‘Cellium’ Jovel had an otherworldly 2022 season. The dominant AR has not yet lifted a major trophy in Call of Duty Vanguard, but his 1.22 overall KD and 1.25 hardpoint KD lead the league. Cellium has one more shot at glory in Vanguard at Champs. Here is the CDL All-Star second team. Sib – Hydra – Simp – Attach – All eight All-Stars will be competing in CoD Champs this weekend with a chance to etch their names in the history books.

Call of Duty League 2021: Season 2 format, rules, teams, more ActivisionActivision’s Call of Duty League is set to return on Black Ops Cold War, but what’s in store for the CDL’s second season? Here’s everything we know about the 2021 season. Activision’s inaugural Call of Duty League season kicked off with a bang. With the publishers at the helm, they dished out more than $6 million in prize pool throughout their opening season. The first season of franchising debuted with 12 teams and carried over the five-versus-five format from Treyarch’s Black Ops 4 title. Since then, Activision have made the decision to revert back to Call of Duty’s competitive roots and have switched back to four-versus-four action for the 2021 season. So with that in mind, there’s plenty of scope for change ahead of Treyarch’s game. Here’s everything you need to know to keep on top of the changes and what they mean for the Call of Duty League moving forward. Jump to section CDL 2021: Dates & schedule There is no start date set in stone for the Call of Duty League’s first event of the second season as of yet. But there are some dates worth noting, as these will have an impact on how the season pans out. Per the official roster construction guidelines, players whose contract was not extended prior to 11:59 PM (PT) on September 13 are now considered free agents. This means that from this time, free agents may enter into new player contracts with any team in the CDL. It’s worth mentioning that September 14 marks the beginning of the new CDL season. With that said, it’s not yet known how Activision and Treyarch will work together to embed the CDL into Black Ops Cold War. So the first event may depend entirely on what the game looks like at release. Below are some notable dates. Last year’s start date: January 24-26. – Contract extension deadline: September 13 at 11:59 PM (PT). – CDL Season 2 begins (transfer window opens): September 14 at 00:00 (PT). – Black Ops Cold War release date: November 13. – Call of Duty League: Season 2 format The most significant change to the Call of Duty League is no doubt that they’re reverting back to a four-versus-four format. What this means for the league is that one player from each roster will be culled. Activision has also confirmed that no teams will be added as part of Season 2, meaning that the total number of starters will be reduced from 60 down to 48. Since competition for a spot on a CDL team is at an all-time high, players will be doing the utmost to land their spot on franchise. Whether the same online format will carry over to the start of the season or whether Activision will be looking into a bubble system — similar to the infrastructure adopted by Riot Games for Worlds 2020. In terms of how events will be run, each team will take turns to either host an online or offline Home Series event. The same tournament-style structure from the inaugural season will likely carry over to Black Ops Cold War. Teams will be pitted into two groups of four teams, with four teams sitting an event out. The top two teams will progress from the Group Stage to Playoffs, which is a single-elimination bracket. Teams will settle the score via a best-of-five match, in which the game modes will be Hardpoint, Search & Destroy and either Capture the Flag, Control or Domination. Teams bag 10 CDL Points for winning a match, which contribute to the Regular Season standings. For reference, here’s a breakdown of how CDL Point were allocated last season: 1st – 50 CDL Points. – 2nd – 30 CDL Points. – 3rd/4th – 20 CDL Points. – 5th/6th – 10 CDL Points. – 7th/8th – 0 CDL Points. – Teams will battle for the best position in the league by competing in nine Home Series events throughout the season, which will grant them the opportunity to bag as many CDL Points as possible. Another significant change for the upcoming 2021 season is that the CDL has transitioned to PC. Players will continue to slay on the sticks, but must use a League-approved controller of their choice. Presumably, this means that they’ll have an expanded pool of peripherals to use, so that they’ll be able to choose between either PlayStation or Xbox controllers (depending on preference). CDL Season 2 teams Twelve teams are locked in for the second season of the Call of Duty League. While Activision has ambitions to expand the CDL, they have halted plans to do so, given the current travel restrictions imposed by the ongoing health situation. The confirmed franchises for CDL Season 2 are: Atlanta FaZe – Chicago Huntsmen – Dallas Empire – Florida Mutineers – London Royal Ravens – Los Angeles Guerrillas – Minnesota RØKKR – New York Subliners – OpTic Gaming Los Angeles – Paris Legion – Seattle Surge – Toronto Ultra – For the latest updates on team rosters, stay tuned to our dedicated Call of Duty League off-season rostermania hub. Keep this page bookmarked, as we’ll update this with the latest Call of Duty League news as it develops.

Call of Duty League 2020 post-season power rankings Activision[jwplayer sD84salO] The inaugural season of the Call of Duty League has officially ended, with Dallas Empire crowned world champions after their 5-1 win over Atlanta FaZe at the CDL Championship Weekend. It’s been an action-packed season, especially with the entire competitive landscape changing as events were moved online, but the season ended just as it began, with Dallas, Atlanta and Chicago Huntsmen looking to claim the throne. After every CDL Home Series we’ve compiled our power rankings for the team’s that were performing best at the time, but now we look back at the season as a whole and see who was the best — and worst — across the entire year. We also compare their final position to how we ranked them pre-season, which definitely makes for some interesting reading. 12. Seattle Surge Preseason ranking: 7th (-5) There’s not a lot to be said for Seattle Surge. They were closely contested with Los Angeles Guerrillas for most of the season for the last place in the CDL standings, despite Octane arguably being one of the best players in the game. There was never really a point where Seattle looked as though they could start moving upwards, and spent much of the season relying on the lowest-seeded teams losing, rather than getting wins themselves, in hopes they could capitalize. 11. Los Angeles Guerrillas Preseason ranking: 11th (-) LA Guerrillas, unlike Seattle, did have one or two events where they looked half-decent, but it never really stretched that far. The Guerrillas didn’t have high expectations on their shoulders headed into the league, with a distinct lack of real star power, but eventually seemed to be a stronger team than closest rivals Seattle Surge. 10. Paris Legion Preseason ranking: 12th (+2) Paris had a truly impressive run of losses between April and July 2020 after getting off to a pretty impressive start, which really scarpered their chances of being placed higher in our power rankings. They managed to find some semblance of form again in the final weeks, but it was too little, too late at that point, and Paris were resigned to being a lower-table team. 9. Minnesota RØKKR Preseason ranking: 4th (-5) The RØKKR might be one of the most confusing teams of the 2020 CDL season. After kicking it off looking strong, even verging on title contenders, there was a sizeable downward trajectory for the team. This culminated in a roster change heading into Champs, with GodRx being replaced by Exceed, but there was no saving them: the team finished the season with just one series win in their last 13. 8. OpTic Gaming Los Angeles Preseason ranking: 9th (+1) On paper, the OpTic Gaming LA side at the start of the year looked like serious championship contenders. Surprisingly, quite the opposite turned out to be the case in the opening months of the season, and the team especially struggled to keep up momentum when the league went online. Though they showed signs of overcoming their difficulties, it was never quite enough to be regarded as a top team, though they were frequently pushing upwards, despite online struggles. 7. Toronto Ultra Preseason ranking: 10th (+3) Choosing between Toronto and London for this spot was a tough choice. They’re both fairly comfortably middle-of-the-pack teams that had one or two standout performances, especially towards the end of the season. It took several roster shuffles to find what works for Toronto, but by the end of the year they became a competitive side that was capable of challenging even the very best. That said, their early-season form can’t be ignored. They were really struggling at the start, with some heralding them as the worst team in the game — something London never had to suffer through, hence why they edge just ahead of Toronto. 6. London Royal Ravens Preseason ranking: 8th (+2) London’s standout performance at CDL Champs was one that almost nobody saw coming. Although the team clearly had potential, and did manage a second-place finish at CDL Seattle, expectations weren’t that high for the squad. London were often found towards the middle or bottom of the standings at each Home Series event, coming 5-6th at almost every one, but never looking like they were completely lost. 5. New York Subliners Preseason ranking: 5th (-) New York Subliners had their moments in the spotlight this season, including a big win over Chicago Huntsmen to claim first place at their own Home Series event. They were regular names among the top four at events, but rarely managed to break that barrier. As far as the mid-table teams go, New York were undoubtedly the strongest for the duration of the season. 4. Florida Mutineers Preseason ranking: 6th (+2) Florida Mutineers had quite an up-and-down year. They won three Home Series events, but there were plenty of weeks where they just didn’t look up to the task, and their strength over the opposition was clearly dropping off towards the tail end of the season. This culminated in a 7-8th place finish at CDL Champs, with two straight losses to Toronto Ultra and OpTic Gaming Los Angeles, but it’s impossible to forget the period of dominance they had throughout the midpoint of the season. 3. Chicago Huntsmen Preseason ranking: 3rd (-) Chicago Huntsmen had some struggles throughout the season and, despite some unexpected losses, always managed to force their way into the championship discussion thanks to the level of talent on the team. Huntsmen won two Home Series events this year, and a third-place finish at Champs seemed fitting for the team that always looked to be a level above the rest of the field without Atlanta and Dallas. 2. Atlanta FaZe Preseason ranking: 1st (-1) At their best, Atlanta looked like a side that couldn’t be touched. Nobody even came close. A team of youngsters with more raw talent than you could imagine, their sheer ferocity and aggression making them immensely difficult opponents. Though they fell just short at Champs, it doesn’t deplete how they performed throughout the year, and even at their worst Atlanta was still undisputedly a top side. The future is bright for this team. 1. Dallas Empire Preseason ranking: 2nd (+1) Who else? Even at their worst this year, Dallas Empire looked like a formidable team. Not including launch weekend, Dallas placed in the top four of every single Home Series they attended, before topping it off by winning the historic World Championship event. Starting the year just as they ended it, Dallas were dominating online tournaments prior to the CDL kicking off, and they didn’t once lose that fire all year. Now, the question is whether they continue that form into CDL 2021.

Call of Duty League 2020/21 preseason power rankings ActivisionWhile some teams have been playing in online preseason tournaments and scrims, it’s not easy to predict which team is going to win the first Call of Duty League, but you only have to look at the rosters to see that some franchises are looking markedly better than others. I’m taking a look through each roster, assessing their strengths and weaknesses, and ranking them from worst to best. There are many factors that contribute to how teams perform on the big stage, but these rankings are based on scrim results, online tournament results, but most importantly how the players have performed in recent years and the chemistry between them. 12. Paris Legion Luke ‘Louqa’ Rigas – Conrad ‘Shockz’ Rymarek – Denhold ‘Denz’ Taylor – Matthew ‘KiSMET’ Tinsley – Timothy ‘Phantomz’ Landis – Zach ‘Zed’ Denyer – Paul ‘Breszy’ Breszynski – Joshua-Lee ‘Joshh’ Shephard – Paris Legion are one of the teams that could cause an upset, maybe even reaching top 6/8, but none of these players have been consistent enough throughout their careers to justify being placed much higher in my rankings. However, with the guidance of coach and EU veteran Joshh, Paris Legion could prove to be fundamentally sound, and it’ll be down to the players to take the extra step to beat the stronger outfits. They could greatly benefit from signing one superstar player, but this could be a plan for the long-term. Right now, we have a good roster of middle-of-the-pack players that could become superstars over the coming months or years. Player to watch: Louqa is the only one of these players that has no experience at pro level, but he looked fantastic on the uber-successful amateur Mindfreak team from last season. He has a high ceiling, so we’ll have to see if he reaches it. 11. Florida Mutineers Preston ‘Prestinni’ Sanderson – Chance ‘Maux’ Moncivaez – Cesar ‘Skyz’ Bueno – Colt ‘Havok’ McLendon – Bradley ‘Frosty’ Bergstrom – Florida was the last franchise to announce their roster, and really seem like a ‘best of the rest’ type team. They’ve got 2019 world champion Prestinni in their squad, Maux and Havok who have come close to winning championships, and somewhat of a question mark in Frosty, who has only been competing professionally in CoD for a year. I would’ve expected Prestinni to land on a better team given his world championship and playoffs wins, but hopefully he can make this team work and bring some glory to the Sunshine State. Player to watch: At times during Black Ops 4, Maux was an AR capable of contending with the very best. He looked comfortable against the likes of Slasher, Octane and Formal. He will be the player that pushes Florida up the leaderboard come the end of the season, but he’ll need his teammates to pick up some of the legwork. 10. Los Angeles Guerrillas Patrick ‘ACHES‘ Price – Ulysses ‘Aqua’ Silva – Jacob ‘Decemate’ Cato – Renato ‘Saints’ Forza – Andres ‘Lacefield’ Lacefield – I wanted to put Los Angeles below Paris initially, but the fact that the likes of Saints, Aqua, and Aches have championships under their belts pushed them up slightly. Despite that, my hopes aren’t high for the “other” LA team to perform as well as their local rivals, or indeed most of the teams in the league. But if there’s one thing we’ve learned from the last few years, it’s to never count Aches out. The success of the team lies solely in each player finding a level that they haven’t hit in several years – though Decemate could be the key if his form from World War II and Black Ops 4 continues. Player to watch: Saints is the player to watch on this Guerrillas team. He’ll likely be disappointed by his lack of success over the last couple of years but has the potential to be a top-level player, as evidenced by his ability to always be picked up by strong teams. Now, he’s got to prove he’s worth the investment once again. 9. Minnesota Røkkr Adam ‘Assault’ Garcia – Adam ‘GodRX’ Brown – Justin ‘Silly’ Fargo-Palmer – Alex ‘Alexx’ Carpenter – Obaid ‘Asim’ Asim – Kaden ‘Exceed’ Stockdale (Substitute) – Devin ‘TTiny’ Robinson (Substitute) – Minnesota has never been a hub for esports, so many were surprised when the Upper Midwest state became a CoD League franchise. However, having secured their spot, they have picked up a group of talented players that will be able to get results. However, whether they’ll be able to get results on a consistent enough basis to reach the top four or six is another matter. Players like GodRX, Assault, and Alexx are key to Røkkr’s chances of making the upper echelons of this league. Player to watch: GodRX was a fantastic player in Black Ops 4 who, on a top team, could have been winning championships. He will be the player to take this team to new heights if he keeps up his form, so he’s worth keeping an eye on. 8. Toronto Ultra Daniel ‘Loony’ Loza – Anthony ‘Methodz’ Zinni – Carson ‘Brack’ Newberry – Alejandro ‘Luckyy’ López – Adrian ‘Mettallz’ Serrano – Tobias ‘CleanX’ Juul Jønsson – Nicholas ‘Classic’ DiCostanzo – Cameron ‘Cammy’ McKilligan – Ben ‘Bance’ Bance – Mehran ‘Mayhem’ Anjomshoa – Toronto have clearly prepared for all possibilities with their insane roster depth, and it could very well pay off throughout the season, but I feel like they’re missing that superstar player that can individually win games. That said, if Loony, Methodz, Brack and the Spaniards are on form, this team could get very scary, very fast. Player to watch: Methodz will be the most important player in this team if he’s as good as he was in World War II, when he was able to shut down opposition pushes single-handedly. He’s also faced some criticism as a team player, so will be looking to prove his detractors wrong. 7. London Royal Ravens Brad ‘Wuskin’ Marshall – Matthew ‘Skrapz’ Marshall – Dylan ‘Dylan’ Henderson – Jordan ‘Jurd’ Crowley – Rhys ‘Rated’ Price – Sean ‘Seany’ O’Connor (Substitute) – Dylan ‘Madcat’ Daly (Substitute) – The players on this London Royal Ravens team are all incredibly talented – Dylan was a rookie of the year contender in Black Ops 4 and Skrapz has been one of the best players of the last two years. They’re made up of incredibly talented players but I don’t feel like they have it in them to win championships. Besides Jurd, none of them have done so in the past despite coming close, and this doesn’t look like a team that can take on the likes of Clayster, Crimsix or Scump very comfortably. Player to watch: Without doubt, the player to watch this season is Dylan. He set the league alight in 2019 and could’ve improved just about any other professional team, becoming an indispensable player. London are lucky to have him on their side, and he’ll want to prove that this year. 6. Seattle Surge Damon ‘Karma‘ Barlow – Ian ‘Enable’ Wyatt – Sam ‘Octane’ Larew – Josiah ‘Slacked’ Berry – Bryan ‘Apathy’ Zhelyazkov – Seattle Surge have some of the most successful players in CoD history, but they have one small issue that, in my opinion, could hold them back from being the best team in the game. Of the five players on their starting roster, Seattle have four players that are typically role players, with Octane being the only name that has been a main slayer in recent seasons. We will have to wait and see whether the likes of Karma and Apathy can return to levels seen in previous years to make sure this team doesn’t lose simply from being outslayed. Player to watch: For the first time in five years, Karma is not playing alongside the likes of Scump and Crim or under the OpTic Gaming banner. Many believe that he’s not the talent he once was – now is the time for Karma to prove that he’s just as good as he always has been. 5. Atlanta FaZe Tyler ‘Abezy’ Pharris – Chris ‘Simp’ Lehr – McArthur ‘Cellium’ Jovel – Michael ‘MajorManiak’ Szymaniak – Preston ‘Priestahh’ Greiner – This Atlanta side is absolutely a team to watch out for in the future, with five of the most promising talents in Call of Duty on one team. They’re clearly one of the most skilled sides in the league right now, and in the next couple of years they can only continue to get better and become a powerhouse of CoD esports. I’m slightly uncomfortable with how young all of the players on this team are, but they’ve more than proved themselves, with Priestahh, Abezy, and Simp winning multiple championships each last season, with the latter two winning the Call of Duty World Championship. 4. New York Subliners Thomas ‘ZooMaa‘ Paparatto – Donovan ‘Temp’ Laroda – Lamar ‘Accuracy’ Abedi – Trei ‘Zer0’ Morris – Dillon ‘Attach’ Price – Doug ‘Censor‘ Martin (Substitute) – Nick ‘Happy’ Suda (Substitute) – New York Subliners has a healthy mix of players that are adaptable to any meta, and that’s something I definitely see being an advantage to them as the year progresses as well as in future titles. These are all players that have experience of being at the top and have enough firepower to compete with the strongest teams. They’re also joined by coach John ‘Revan’ Boble and analyst John-Paul ‘JPKrez’ Krez, who will offer a level of analytical ability and insight into opponents, their own team, and the game itself that not many will be able to replicate. Player to watch: Temp is never afraid to run his mouth and let his opponents know how good he is, but it’s about time he lets his success on the battlefield do the talking and win the championship he’s been waiting so long for. He’ll have to go above and beyond the call of duty to become a winner this year. 3. Los Angeles OpTic Thomas ‘TJHaly’ Haly – Brandon ‘Dashy’ Otell – Kenny ‘Kenny’ Williams – Austin ‘Slasher’ Liddicoat – Jordan ‘Jkap’ Kaplan – OpTic may not have retained the fans that had stuck with the organization in recent years, but that doesn’t change the fact that they look like they will continue to be a powerhouse with this roster. JKap is one of the smartest players in CoD history, and with a group of some of the strongest slayers in the league around him, LA OpTic will be challenging for titles all season. None of the four other players seem to have had any consistency issues during their time competing – they all have shown from the start that they’re incredibly strong. However, with just one championship-winning season behind him, Dashy will seek to prove that he really is the incredible talent he has showcased himself as in the last year and put more trophies in his cabinet. Although they haven’t been living up to their potential in scrims and online tournaments, there’s no doubt in my mind that this team has the capacity to be world champions. Player to watch: A lot of criticism that OGLA has faced comes from their acquisition of Jkap, who some believe doesn’t have it in him to be a top player anymore. As one of the most decorated veterans in the scene, this probably won’t get to him, but he’ll be looking to prove he’s still one of the best, and if he holds his own then OGLA will be laughing. 2. Dallas Empire James ‘Clayster‘ Eubanks – Anthony ‘Shotzzy’ Cuevas-Castro – Cuyler ‘Huke’ Garland – Indervir ‘iLLeY’ Dhaliwal – Ian ‘Crimsix’ Porter – Thomas ‘Tommey’ Trewren (Substitute) – Dallas Empire have all the makings of a championship-caliber team but they’re at great risk of flopping if players don’t live up to the hype. Crimsix and Clayster aren’t the players they once were – although Clay winning the two biggest events in Black Ops 4 may suggest otherwise – and the risk involved in picking up Shotzzy and Illey is huge. These two, I believe, are the key to the success or misery that comes Dallas’ way. They could end up having a rookie year that resembles that of Simp and Abezy in Black Ops 4, looking untouchable, or the lack of experience could come back to bite them. But, if they can be the players they’re expected to be, Dallas will be a tough team to beat. They’ve already been looking red hot in preseason online tournaments, so we’ll see if they can keep it up. Player to watch: The player to watch is a tough choice between Illey and Shotzzy, with both looking to prove that they’re capable of playing CoD at the highest level. However, Shotzzy is a Halo world champion, so he’s played on the biggest stages. Illey, on the other hand, is somewhat of an enigma at this point in the year. If he lives up to his potential, he might just be this season’s breakout player. 1. Chicago Huntsmen Seth ‘Scump‘ Abner – Matthew ‘Formal‘ Piper – Alec ‘Arcitys’ Sanderson – Dylan ‘Envoy’ Hannon – Peirce ‘Gunless’ Hillman – It’s hard to look at this team and not see championships on the horizon. It’s the perfect blend of young talent and veteran leadership, with a group of players that have grown accustomed to winning multiple championships in recent years. It’s perhaps the most raw talent we’ve seen on a Call of Duty roster for a while, and that will likely be reflected in their results come the start of play in January. Player to watch: All eyes are on Envoy, having had only one good season (in his rookie year, no less) compared to the decades of talent and championship wins between the other players. One good season and he could cement himself as one of the greatest CoD players alive today. So, there you have it. I think Chicago Huntsmen look like the best team going into the Call of Duty League, and with the start of its inaugural season drawing ever-closer, we won’t have to wait long to find out which teams are really the best.

New Call of Duty mobile game launches in select regions A new Call of Duty game has entered alpha play in select regions around the world for mobile on Android, and users in Australia are reporting the game, Call of Duty: Legends of War, is already available for download. Legends of War is made by Tencent Games in China, who also worked on the new PUBG mobile title. The new game, according to the description, “combines the best maps, characters, weapons and gear from the Call of Duty universe and brings them together for the first time.” This game comes just a few weeks after another Call of Duty mobile game, Global Operations, launched as a China-exclusive. Legends of War doesn’t look to be as exclusive and will offer multiplayer PvP and Zombies modes to players as well as classic Call of Duty maps like Nuketown, Crash, & Hijacked. The game already has a Facebook page, which features a trailer showing off some of the game’s different modes. The Facebook page also shares key details about the game: BATTLE ACROSS MULTIPLAYER AND ZOMBIES GAME MODES! Multiplayer – Engage in online fast-paced 5v5 PvP action with several modes including Team Deathmatch, Frontline, and more! – Zombies – Overcome hordes of the undead in stunningly visual PvE Raids. Play Solo or Co-Op with your friends! – TEST YOUR SKILLS IN REAL-TIME PvP MATCHES! Challenge players from across the globe in multiple game-types like Team Deathmatch and Frontline! – Wage war in classic Call of Duty maps including Nuketown, Crash, & Hijacked! – COLLECT ICONIC CALL OF DUTY HEROES & WEAPONS! Play as characters from the Call of Duty Universe, including Call of Duty: Modern Warfare & Call of Duty: Ghosts! – Earn Perks, Weapons, Skills, and Equipment from Supply Drops to customize your loadout to build the ultimate Soldier! – INTUITIVE PICK UP AND PLAY CONTROLS! Revolutionary FPS touch controls built from the ground up for mobile devices. – Fully customizable HUD and settings to play your way. – HIGH-FIDELITY GRAPHICS ON MOBILE! AAA console-quality graphics with detailed visuals and stunning effects! – Immersive 3D graphics for an epic shooter experience. – NOTE: Call of Duty: Legends of War is currently in early Alpha and we are working to improve the game by continuously fixing bugs and adding additional content. Read More: KFC Gaming hilariously roasts Splyce’s coach for “throwing away” huge lead to OpTic Gaming at CWL Vegas – There’s no information yet whether or not the game will become available in more regions or not, but it wouldn’t be surprising to see it made more widely available after the alpha.

Call of Duty launch new CODNation campaign for Black Ops 4 with hilarious Post Malone video Call of Duty have launched a new marketing campaign for the upcoming Black Ops 4, kicking it off with a brilliant Post Malone inspired meme. Call of Duty’s marketing machine has been an integral part of the franchise’s success, ruling the console gaming world for over a decade. With Black Ops 4 coming – the fourth instalment of the most successful sub-franchise of CoD – they have launched a new content focused campaign, encouraging content creators to submit their best/funniest moments. It is a smart move from Activision, as focusing on organic content production from places like YouTube and Twitch has undoubtedly been a key role in the success of other popular games – namely Fortnite. More: Treyarch’s Vonderhaar gives update on Hardcore mode in Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 for first time – With the new Blackout mode coming this year, CoD’s first foray into the battle royale genre, there will be a renewed focus on Call of Duty content from streamers and YouTubers. The official Call of Duty twitter account kicked off the campaign with this hilarious rendition of Post Malone’s hit single ‘Rockstar’, featuring the man himself. This is what happens when you squad up with @PostMalone in #BlackOps4. Make it. Tag it. #CODNation pic.twitter.com/LSpBxq5vpZ — Call of Duty (@CallofDuty) September 30, 2018 You can submit your own videos by posting them to Twitter and using the hashtag #CODNation – which also comes with a Black Ops 4 logo Twitter emote. They’ve since uploaded a number of other submissions to the official Call of Duty YouTube channel, check out some of the best below:

Call of Duty pro John furious with latest planned addition to gentleman’s agreement Call of Duty star Johnathon ‘John’ Perez has hit out at his fellow pro players amid rumors that they intend to add the Rampart 17 assault rifle to the list of Black Ops 4 gentleman’s agreements. Gentleman’s agreements are created by Call of Duty professional players to stop the use of a weapon or item that they deem to be either too powerful, or too easy to use, thus cheapening the match. These items are generally added outside of the normal CWL rules, although they can sometimes be added to the official ruleset at a later time. Pros have already added guns like the Mozu to the agreement, and have also taken aim at AI-controlled scorestreaks, as they do not require the player who earned them to be in control of them when they are used. The Rampart 17 has become the latest weapon to come under scrutiny in the pro community, after Nicholas ‘Classic’ DiCostanzo used the assault rifle with great success in Luminosity’s victory at CWL Fort Worth. While many players are calling for its removal, his teammate John is infuriated by the calls. “Pros are trying to [gentleman’s agreement] the Rampart,” wrote John on Twitter. “Good luck to everyone, people really are mindfucked.” Pros trying to GA the rampart lmao GL to everyone ppl really are mindfucked pic.twitter.com/KI1GJG17AN — LG John (@John287) March 22, 2019 Perez then took aim at two of the game’s more powerful weapons, asking why they remained untouched but the Rampart had become an issue: “Nobody is talking about the ICR or the Maddox though. Double grip and double quickdraw, it’s fine, right? For some reason they were more worried about the goddamn Mozu.” Ain’t no one talking about the ICR or Maddox tho…. Double grip and double quickdraw…. nawww its fine right? For some reason they were more worried about the god damn Mozu tho — LG John (@John287) March 22, 2019 This isn’t the first time that John has voiced his frustration regarding gentleman’s agreements. During the World War II season, the Luminosity star labelled the rules implement by fellow pro players as “bullshit.” “Gentleman’s agreements should never be a thing,” wrote Perez on Twitter in March 2018. “If it’s in the game, I’m going to use it, point blank, period.” Gentleman agreements should never be a thing and I’m tired of everyone’s bs if it’s in the game I’m going to use it point blank period. — LG John (@John287) March 29, 2018 Whether the Rampart is added to Call of Duty’s gentlemen’s agreement is unknown at this time, but it appears that a large section of pro players are in favor of its removal from the competitive scene. It’s likely that we won’t know for certain until the CWL Pro League resumes on Monday, March 25.

Call of Duty: Is the Koshka the best sniper rifle in Black Ops 4? Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 was released back in October, yet sniper rifle specialists still can’t agree on which weapon is the most powerful. While some prefer the Paladin HB50, others use the Koshka to pick off enemies, and fans of each have been defending their weapon of choice for the past few months. YouTuber and Call of Duty expert Brad ‘Drift0r’ Overbey is hoping to settle the argument with his latest video, in which he takes an in-depth look at the Koshka to find out just how good it is in Black Ops 4. Drift0r states that the lowest damage the Koshka will deal with one shot is 150 health points when the bullet hits the hands or feet of an opponent, while a shot to the head, neck or chest above the pectoral muscles will result in a one-shot kill even if they are using armor. While players who enjoy Quickscoping with sniper rifles do use the Koshka, Drift0r believes that those who are sticking with the Paladin in Black Ops 4 are making a mistake. Overbey reckons that the Koshka is the most well-balanced sniper in the game, arguing that the weapon’s better mobility sets it apart. Given its impressive damage statistics, Drift0r thinks that a Koshka with Quickdraw and either a scope or an ELO sight can be used to great effect in Black Ops 4, especially in close-quarters combat where sniper rifles generally struggle. However, it is a different story in Blackout, Call of Duty’s battle royale mode. Here, Driftor says the Koshka is perhaps the worst sniper rifle you can use. The Koshka is still a decent weapon in this mode if it’s all you can find, but the Paladin is more powerful at long range, while the SDMM and the Outlaw have a faster rate of fire. You can watch Drift0r’s full breakdown of the Koshka sniper rifle in the video below.

Call of Duty insider gives update on rumored franchise rosters MLGCompetitive Call of Duty insider ‘CDL Intel’ has revealed a number of new rumors surrounding rosters in the upcoming franchise league. With the Black Ops 4 season in the rearview mirror, the focus for Call of Duty esports has shifted towards Modern Warfare and the upcoming franchised league that is set to start in early 2020. The league, which has been confirmed as only having 12 teams for the inaugural season, has already opened its signing period for players – with London, New York, and Paris confirming their line-ups. As the wait goes on for official announcements, fans are clamoring for more early information from insiders like CDL Intel. The popular Twitter account has been giving regular updates on what they hear, including the possibility of some players making over $26,000 per month in their new franchised contracts. There have also been rumors about further roster moves, with Toronto having between eight and ten players for their team, GRVTY and Jurnii possibly joining up with Atlanta, and Tinyy apparently headed for Minnesota. CDL Intel has also revealed what they’ve previously heard about possible coaches and game type analysts. Former OpTic coach Teepee may head to Chicago, Nubzy might be linking up with the Seattle team, Merk and Rambo are possibly coaching with Dallas, with MuTeX also joining them as the Search and Destroy analyst or possible substitute. RUMOURS: Some small stuff I’ve heard over the last few weeks that I couldn’t get confirmed, some of it is old and likely outdated. These won’t be as accurate as the full rosters. pic.twitter.com/AhqdSPSNSW — CDL Intel (@INTELCallofDuty) October 7, 2019 The insider has, repeatedly, also shared the rosters that they’ve heard for each team – with this update being no different. All the rosters, expect the confirmed London, New York, and Paris squads, that have been reported by CDL Intel can be found below. Note: These rosters are not confirmed, and remain only rumors. Atalanta: aBeZy, Cellium, Priettaah, Simp, and MajorManiak – Chicago: Scump, FormaL, Envoy, Gunless, and Arcitys – Dallas: Huke, Crimsix, Clayster, iLLEY, and Shotzzy – Florida: Maux, Skyz, Prestinni, Frosty, and Havok – OpTic LA: Dashy, TJHaly, Kenny, SlasheR, and JKap – LA Kronke [Uncompleted]: Aches, Aqua, Saints, Decemate – Minnesota: Alexx, Asim, Silly, GodRX, and Assault – Seattle: Karma, Octane, Enable, Slacked, and apathy – Toronto: Loony, Methodz, Brack, Metalz, Luckky, CleanX, and others – Of course, while CDL Intel has been reliable for information in the past, these rumors should be taken with a pinch of salt until they are confirmed by their respective teams. Things can, and often do, change before the official announcement – so some moves could very well be in the pipeline for a number of teams that they haven’t heard just yet.

Call of Duty insider claims to reveal full Toronto franchise CoD roster Freepik/CoD Toronto/ActivisionA reputable Call of Duty insider has revealed new information regarding the final player spot for the CoD Toronto franchise moving into the 2020 CDL season. With Modern Warfare around the corner and the 2020 CDL season fast approaching, the announcement of franchise rosters are coming in thick and fast. Many have speculated where their favorite players are likely to end up, and eagle-eyed fans have even correlated Twitter posts from players like Crimsix to assume their prospective team. Up until this point, @INTELCallofDuty has remained in-the-loop with all of the latest rumors amid the rostermania chaos; sharing their findings with their social media following. In a post titled “Small update on Toronto”, the leaker revealed the final roster, with the addition of Mehran ‘Mayhem’ Anjomshoa supposedly filling the final spot on the roster 10-man roster. Small update on Toronto: Mayhem got the last spot. Brack, Methodz, Loony, Luckyy, Mettalz, CleanX, Classic, Bance, Cammy & Mayhem. https://t.co/sXzVbIfyKt — CDL Intel (@INTELCallofDuty) October 13, 2019 Confirmed CoD x Toronto staff: General Manager: Dominique ‘wi5dom12’ Gelineau – Strategic Coach: Mark ‘MarkyB’ Bryceland (from Splyce) – Leaked CoD x Toronto roster: Carson ‘Brack’ Newberry (from Luminosity Gaming) – Anthony ‘Methodz’ Zinni (from UYU) – Daniel ‘Loony’ Loza (from Splyce) – Alejandro ‘Lucky’ López (from Team Heretics) – Adrian ‘MeTTalZz’ Serrano (from Team Heretics) – Tobias ‘CleanX’ Juul Jønsson (from Team Singularity) – Nicholas ‘Classic’ DiCostanzo (from UYU) – Ben ‘Bance’ Bance (from Celtic FC Esports) – Cameron ‘Cammy’ McKilligan (from Units) – Mehran ‘Mayhem’ Anjomshoa (from Enigma6) – A simple scroll through previous posts validates the accuracy of their claims, with the insider posting intel about James ‘Clayster’ Eubanks’ addition to the Dallas franchise long before the official reveal. Should the leaks hold substance, Loony will be rejoining MarkyB as the ex-Splyce pro announced his position as Strategic Coach within the Toronto–based franchise back in August. Moreover, the ex-UYU and Team Heretics pairs will join forces with a host of international talent, that will comprise Canada’s sole representative in the 2020 CDL season. The official unveiling of the squad is reportedly set for October 24, just in time for the release of Modern Warfare 24 hours later.

Call of Duty insider claims SBMM returning in Black Ops Cold War Activision[jwplayer bvPiezuD] If Call of Duty insider TheLongSensation is to be believed, Treyarch and Raven’s upcoming Black Ops Cold War will see the return of skill-based matchmaking (SBMM) from Modern Warfare, which has been strongly criticized by the Call of Duty community. While Modern Warfare does boast a fairly large community, there’s one thing that a lot of players agree: skill-based matchmaking does more harm than good. In theory, it’s a good concept, forcing players of similar skill-level to compete against one another. In practice, however, many have been complaining that it ruins the experience, with some people suggesting the implementation of separate casual and ranked modes in order to fix this problem. Regardless of certain players’ feelings on it, however, it seems like it’s here to stay, as Activision have point-blank refused to even comment on it, despite numerous inquiries. Call of Duty insider TheLongSensation, also known as Tom Henderson, has confirmed on Twitter that, not only will SBMM return with Black Ops Cold War, it’ll apparently be the exact same system as the one implemented in Modern Warfare. This will surely be extremely disappointing for players to hear, as many were hoping for, at the very least, a toned-down version of SBMM or, as previously mentioned, a separation between casual matches and ranked skill-based playlists. The criticism towards the system has been pretty substantial ever since Modern Warfare was originally released back in October of 2019, and it’s only grown with the release of Warzone in March, especially since many believe it’s stronger in the battle royale than in multiplayer. https://twitter.com/_TomHenderson_/status/1296479171485618177?s=20 Big-name Call of Duty content creators like former OpTic Gaming member James Spratt have claimed that the inclusion of SBMM could “ruin” Black Ops Cold War, so it is a bit surprising to see Activision continue with its implementation. This is all, of course, based on rumors and speculation, as nothing can be confirmed until Activision or Treyarch make an official announcement. Considering that it’s highly unlikely either of them will comment on SBMM, we’ll have no choice but to wait for the game to release before coming to any conclusions. Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War is set to be officially revealed within Warzone on Wednesday, August 26.

Call of Duty hints at Warzone Stadium opening in latest Season 5 teaser Infinity Ward[jwplayer SZm0PqRr] After a few days of getting basically nothing, Call of Duty has once again started teasing Season 5 of Modern Warfare and Warzone, this time through a cleverly worded tweet. Teasers for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare and Warzone Season 5 are nothing new. So far, Activision has released three official teasers through popular content creators like NICKMERCS, TeePee, and JackFrags. These teasers gave players nice little hints at what’s coming next in Warzone, such as trains and an explosion at the Stadium. After a few days of no new sneak peeks, the official Call of Duty Twitter account posted what appears to be another teaser, this time hidden as a seemingly innocent tweet. The tweet features a picture of the Stadium area in Warzone, followed by the text that says “our doors to open to ideas” about what the arena should be named. https://twitter.com/CallofDuty/status/1288520194386620416?s=20 At face value, the tweet seems to be nothing more than just a way for the CoD Twitter to pick up some engagement. However, it’s highly unlikely that the wording of the caption is a coincidence, so it’s probably safe to assume that this is strongly hinting that the Stadium is going to finally open up during Season 5. It’s also the most direct that Activision have been about the arena being accessible since posting some promotional Warzone art a few weeks back that showed the gigantic building’s roof wide open. The question now is how the devs will go about doing this. Two of the previous teasers have shown an explosion going off in the area, which led some people to believe that the top of the building is going to get blown off. This tweet, however, seems to hint that the doors themselves are going to literally open. Could this upcoming change be a combination of both? It shouldn’t be too much longer before we know the answer, as Season 5 is set to release on Wednesday, August 5. It’s probable that Activision and Infinity Ward will release official trailers and a roadmap leading up to the launch date, so we’ll know a lot more in the coming days.

Call of Duty: Here’s why Gunless didn’t shake OpTic Gaming’s hands at CWL Vegas Some Call of Duty fans were incensed when Pierce ‘Gunless’ Hillman failed to shake hands or even acknowledge OpTic Gaming at CWL Las Vegas, but many of his colleagues think it’s been blown out of proprtion. Following Luminosity’s match-up with Optic Gaming on day two of the tournament, the OpTic squad left their seats and walked across the stage to shake hands with their fallen opponents after a 3-0 victory. While almost all Luminosity players bumped fists with OpTic, Hillman failed to turn away from his screen, seemingly declining to partake in the customary after-match ritual. Fans believed this decision from Gunless was disrespectful, with some pointing out that Matthew ‘FormaL’ Piper took part in the handshakes, even though he left OpTic Gaming earlier in the year. However, during the Wednesday, December 19 episode of Anthony ‘NAMELESS’ Wheeler’s CoDCast, CWL On-Air Personality Jonathan ‘Pacman’ Tucker revealed that Gunless didn’t refuse to shake OpTic’s hand intentionally. “He wasn’t purposefully not shaking hands with OpTic,” stated Pacman. “I asked him, and he said he didn’t know what people were talking about and he was just pissed that they lost. He didn’t even know they were behind him.” “If you guys knew Gunless, and knew his personality – he wasn’t shrugging off OpTic, he was just staring at his screen.” NAMELESS went on to confirm that OpTic didn’t feel disrespected by Gunless, and they had no issues with the Luminosity star. The return of Wheeler’s Call of Duty esports focused podcast provided plenty of discussion regarding Gunless. Pro players Chris ‘Parasite’ Duarte, Austin ‘SlasheR’ Liddicoat and Donovan “Temp” Laroda clashed with NAMELESS and Pacman as they discussed whether Hillman or Brandon “Dashy” Otell is the best Black Ops 4 player in the world.

Call of Duty has lost its way and it’s hard to see how it can recover ActivisionConstant unpopular updates filled with changes and alterations that only seem to frustrate are proving Call of Duty has lost its way, with serious repercussions heading in its direction. Call of Duty has lost its focus. Unique changes, unpopular operators, broken features, and a refusal to listen to the community it caters for has forced the game’s integrity and future into question. For many, Call of Duty is on a fast track to failure. With the game careening uncontrollably around undesired updates and smashing through the barriers of community confusion, frustration, and rejection, all preparing to run itself off those tracks and leave behind damage that may never be resolved. A path to self-destruction The past few years of Call of Duty have been interesting, to say the least. The well-timed nature of Modern Warfare and Warzone propelled Activision back into the spotlight, with both titles garnering an outstanding playerbase and what many regard as a heyday in modern-day CoD. Shortly after, in the years to come, this success would shift completely on its head, with the average Black Ops Cold War and forgettable Vanguard rearing their heads to show how quickly such popularity can change. So, when MW2 released, it’s easy to say fans were hopeful and wished to see the franchise go back to its roots. For a while, it felt like Activision had achieved this. The maps were interesting, the weapons were exciting, and players flocked into the lobbies, but only for a short time, until the game began to decline once again. MW2 received a lack of love shortly after those initial months ended, being met with constant community scrutiny and plenty of bugs to add to these frustrations. One key element that aided the game’s downfall was when The Boy’s collaboration came to fruition. Introducing superpowers, ridiculous operators, and making changes to maps made players take a step back and see MW2 for what it was — another crumbled brick in the wall of CoD’s once-stable foundation. Leaving ‘realism’ for more than a Fortnite One of the largest reasons for Call of Duty’s stumble is its handling of Operators. One of the best elements of a FPS like MW2 is being able to choose your fighter, bringing a sense of personality and even nostalgia from some bundles. Such a design allows you to feel represented and unique as you explore the maps, but there comes a point where all that changes. Especially when you end up turning the corner to meet either a rat, a cat, or instead, laser eyes as they incinerate you with no hope of fighting back. Ultimately, the principle of adding superheroes and unrealistic operators takes away from that design many love. Sure, Noir feels closer to CoD, in the same way as Shredder did, but few elements take you away from an intense battle than fighting against a feline. The collaboration and cat skins feel more akin to the style of Fortnite than CoD and, despite only being in the game for a few months, have had a profound impact on the community, leaving them in uproar over superpowers, divided over certain skins, and wishing for change. Beloved classics be damned Accompanying unpopular Operators is Activision’s refusal to bring back key features or items from their past successes, especially after players beg for their return. The likes of Shoothouse and Shipment were a high point in Modern Warfare and many were thrilled to see it back in MW2. But Warzone fans drew the short straw, being forced to say goodbye to some incredible maps through Warzone 2. Leaving Verdansk, Rebirth, and even Fortune’s Keep behind in favor of newer, more untouched experiences. There’s a case to be made for introducing new maps, as the developers have done, stating how “it feels almost like it takes some time to get used to something new” and that players often slate a new map at the beginning but end up regarding it as a classic as the next title rolls out. However, despite these comments, as the saying goes, ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’ which is the case for those three Warzone maps. The Warzone community is always wishing for either Verdansk, Rebirth, or Fortune’s Keep to be placed back in the game. Yet Activision refuses to. By refusing to cater to the community, the fanbase withers away, with many looking to head to similar battle royales, with stiff competition from the likes of Apex Legends. On top of this, the developers provide little explanation when it comes to omitting classic maps, features, and game modes, with the fan favorite Gunfight disappearing during Season 4 Reloaded. In multiplayer, a similar issue is occurring, but instead of maps, it’s features. Players call for the classic minimap, or a traditional perk system, but Activision refused to change, promoting new, unpopular features instead. Few elements drive a community away like miscommunication, stubbornness, and enforcing unpopular changes to a previously successful game. The case for Modern Warfare 3 Driving players away is a dire situation for Activision, with the Call of Duty player count constantly dropping despite new Seasons and content. It’s clear whatever chances the franchise takes, it seems to only make the community more and more frustrated. Naturally, in any live-service game, the community will get angry at the developers from time to time, especially with so much constantly changing. However, this frustration for CoD extends far past the point of return for many players, throwing the success of the future MW3 into question. Leaks that the classic mini-map and Ninja Perk would be returning pleased most of the community but it hasn’t stopped many from threatening to boycott the new title after seeing the state of MW2. The notion that weapons, operators, and bundles will be transferred to MW3, almost makes the title a DLC of its predecessor rather than a new game. Call of Duty has long been an industry giant, with hundreds of thousands of players joining the fray. But thanks to the state of the franchise it’s clear CoD has lost its way, meaning there’s little incentive for fans to purchase MW3.

Call of Duty hacker reveals exactly how he cheats in Warzone YouTube, @RaraWith Call of Duty: Warzone’s hacker drama showing no signs of slowing down, a Facebook streamer has explained how he’s able to cheat and comfortably withstand Activision’s countermeasures. Going by ‘Boricua Rage Gaming’ on Facebook, a streamer, who considers himself a “modder” rather than a “hacker,” has gained popularity for showing viewers the point-of-view of someone using cheats. Promoting transparency, he revealed precisely how he cheats in Warzone and is able to continue doing so despite developers’ efforts. Warzone debuted in March 2020 and the Infinity Ward title’s biggest ban wave occurred on September 28 when around 20,000 accounts were permanently suspended due to detection of disallowed hacking software. Now, Treyarch and Raven Software have entered the fold alongside Black Ops Cold War’s integration, yet cheaters remain prevalent. In an interview with YouTube’s Rara, who previously revealed how Warzone competitors were reverse-boosting into bot lobbies to farm content, Boricua Rage shared his perspective on how easy it is to hack in CoD’s battle royale. Noting that he got into hacking after dying to one and began streaming his cheats live in August, Boricua Rage explains that he’s “just a normal player like the rest of us.” Further, he would rather be dubbed a modder than a hacker because he is “not the one who broke the game.” As for the specific process to hacking – or as he would prefer it, modding – Boricua Rage found a website he was comfortable with based on reviews and ease of process. He then opted to purchase a hack that “spoofs” (hides his IP address) and allows for both Aim FOV (control over the aimbot’s field of view and distance) and ESP (Extra Sensory Perception, which reveals other users’ information — capable of including location through walls and even weapons in use). After purchasing the hack, the next step is to avoid bans. In the September ban wave, which Boricua Rage calls “the big, big, big, big, big, big ban wave,” he lost a total of 80 accounts. But that was only a slight hindrance, as he claims he is able to continue using new ones weekly because he has “a buddy who hooks them up.” As Boricua Rage explains, continually creating new accounts is one way to stave off Activision’s efforts and, on the hackers’ side, updating engines is another. While new accounts bypass shadow bans and permanent bans, engine creators will also update their software as soon as developers’ anti-cheat detection programs figure out their current hacks. In sum, he explains the efforts to curb hacking as a tug-of-war between software engineers on both sides: “There’s a lot of smart people out there that counter. It’s just a never-ending war, you know? When they do something, it takes a little bit for the other guys to catch up.”

Call of Duty: H3CZ shows behind-the-scenes look at OpTic Gaming’s CWL Vegas boot camp vs eUnited With the $250,000 CWL Vegas tournament fast approaching, the Call of Duty pro teams of OpTic Gaming and eUnited are hard at work in preparation. The teams, who are two of the favorites to go deep and do well at the upcoming event, are boot-camping out of a warehouse space in Texas that is known as the HECZQUARTERS, named after CEO Hector ‘H3CZ’ Rodriguez. In a video he posted to his Twitter account, H3CZ gives fans a behind-the-scenes glimpse of the atmosphere at the boot camp, which features the two teams facing off against each other in a LAN setup. Also present are the two teams’ coaches – OpTic’s Tyler ‘TeeP’ Polchow and eU’s Brian ‘Saint’ Baroska – who have their own monitors and get to spectate their team’s respective in-game performances. “If they build it they will come, said the magic magic man,” H3CZ said in his video. Although the setup is far from the majestic scenes expected at CWL Vegas, the competitive spirit and atmosphere is very much on par, best exemplified by the frantic call-outs and communication heard from both sides. Behind the Scenes at the #HECZQUARTERS. Crazy, @Nadeshot didn’t want to come with his team… Sad pic.twitter.com/8q94n5ZUy2 — Hector Rodriguez (@OpTicH3CZ) December 3, 2018 Boot camping is important in the days leading up to a major tournament, especially if it’s the first one of a new season, which is what CWL Vegas will be. Almost every professional competitor will admit that there is a huge difference between playing online vs LAN, thus preparing at a LAN-style setup rather than over the internet is almost necessary for success. Both teams will head to Vegas feeling confident that they’ll do well, especially OpTic, who are favorites to win the event after placing first in all three major online tournaments they’ve played so far. The Green Wall is in Pool D with Splyce and G2 Esports, while the boys in red and blue are in Pool A with 100 Thieves and Team Reciprocity. Speaking of 100 Thieves, H3CZ couldn’t resist but throw some friendly shade at the fact that the org and CEO Matt ‘Nadeshot’ Haag, who is a close friend of HECZ, were absent from the boot camp, despite having received an invitation. “Crazy, Nadehsot didn’t want to come with his team,” he tweeted. “Sad.” CWL Vegas will take place December 7-9 and will feature teams from all over the world facing off for a larger share of the $250,000 prize pool and a crucial chunk of Pro Points. Disclaimer: Hector ‘H3CZ’ Rodriguez is a minority shareholder in Dexerto Ltd.

Call of Duty ‘goes dark’ across social media ahead of rumored Modern Warfare reveal Call of Duty‘s social channels have been dramatically changed, only days out from when fans expect a reveal for the 2019 game, rumored to be titled ‘Modern Warfare‘. On May 28, the official Instagram page for Call of Duty was wiped entirely, with all posts temporarily archived, and their Twitter and Facebook accounts were updated with new profile images. The images are simply all black, with the exception of a new, and very plain, Call of Duty logo, giving away very little about what fans can expect from the next title. One thing is for sure though – the yearly Call of Duty hype train has officially departed the station, and is now accepting passengers. Long-time fans of the series have been expecting a teaser of some kind for weeks, with first glimpses at the new CoD game usually given earlier in May each year. If leaks are accurate, we will be getting our first look at ‘Modern Warfare’ on May 30, which is said to be a “soft reboot” of the MW franchise. Other details are scarce, but according to sources, the game’s campaign will be “inspired” by Modern Warfare 2’s “No Russian” – the controversial mission which put players in the position of a terrorist carrying out a mass shooting at an airport. This mission, unsurprisingly, caused plenty of debate, and YouTuber LongSensation suggests that the upcoming Modern Warfare (not to be confused with 2007’s CoD 4: Modern Warfare, or 2016’s Modern Warfare Remastered) will be the “most controversial” yet. Although there may be a teaser of some kind on May 30, it’s unclear how much this will explain and how much will be kept under wraps, as Call of Duty is also attending E3, and will likely release more information there.

Call of Duty: Full list of qualified Black Ops 4 teams for 2019 CWL Pro League As the qualifier tournament for the Call of Duty World League’s Pro League rolls on, more and more teams are qualifying for the CWL’s highest level of competition. The 2019 CWL Pro League for Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 is due to begin on February 4, but only four of the 16 teams were confirmed before the play-in qualification event began. Those teams are the top four finishers from CWL Las Vegas in December – OpTic Gaming, eUnited, Splyce and Luminosity Gaming. Every other team left Vegas knowing that their job was only just getting started, and that they’d need to bring their A game to the Play-In event when it got underway on January 16. One team that did just that was Midnight Esports, who torched through the first three days of competition with a perfect 5-0 record to become the only team to lock up a spot prior to the final day of Pool Play. Over the course of the next few days, the list of teams moving to the Pro League grew, with some surprising inclusions and exclusions. Below, you can find all of the teams that have secured a spot in the 2019 CWL Pro League so far. We’ll be updating this list every time a new team qualifies. 1 – OpTic Gaming OpTic have looked dominant in Black Ops 4. OpTic Gaming put a disappointing WWII season behind them and were the dominant force online when Black Ops 4 released. They backed that form up at the first event of the year, CWL Las Vegas, with an impressive win. OpTic will be heavy favorites for the CWL Pro League when matches begin. 2 – eUnited Clayster was the vocal leader for eUnited in Vegas. A second place finish at the first event of the Black Ops 4 season gave eUnited all the confidence they needed. James ‘Clayster’ Eubanks and company will come into the CWL Pro League with a desire to dethrone OpTic. 3 – Splyce Jurd’s left Europe behind in his quest for Call of Duty glory. Despite their third place finish at CWL Las Vegas, Splyce undoubtedly gave OpTic Gaming their closest matches. With the firepower on this roster, counting them out would be foolish. 4 – Luminosity Gaming SLACKED will have a point to prove when the Pro League begins. You could be forgiven for having no idea that Luminosity actually managed to qualify for the Pro League. The team looked lackluster throughout CWL Las Vegas and it’s hard to believe that they managed to secure fourth place at all. However, any team with players like Matt ‘FormaL’ Piper and Pierce ‘Gunless’ Hillman on the roster is one that shouldn’t be underestimated. 5- Midnight Esports Midnight Esports shocked everyone with a perfect 6-0 record in Pool C at the CWL Pro League Qualifier. With Pool C containing teams like 100 Thieves and Team SpaceLy, few were looking towards Midnight as a team that could come out of the group on top, but they defied all expectations with a string of incredibly dominant performances that carried them right into the CWL Pro League. This roster is filled with some amazing young talent including the likes of Dylan ‘Envoy’ Hannon and Devin ‘LlamaGod’ Tran that will no doubt be a team to keep an eye out for once the Pro League starts up. 6 – Team Envy Apathy hopes to lead Envy to a Pro League title in 2019. Despite a somewhat shaky performance at CWL Vegas, Team Envy has now bounced back completely with a dominant showing in Pool B of the CWL Pro League Qualifier. After winning their first five games in Pool Play, the team secured a Top 2 finish in the Pool and will now look ahead towards the Pro League in just a few weeks. 7 – UYU UYU showed they aren’t a team to be taken lightly with an incredibly performance at the Qualifier. UYU might have fallen a bit short at CWL Vegas with a 13th-16th place finish, they came into the Pro League Qualifier looking to prove themselves as one of the best teams in Call of Duty and they did just that with a strong showing in Pool D. With quality wins over Mindfreak and Red Reserve, they coasted to a 4-1 record after their first five matches and that was all they needed to earn their spot in the Pro League. 8 – 100 Thieves 100 Thieves overcame some early struggles to secure their spot in the CWL Pro League. 100 Thieves journey at the Qualifier certainly got off to a rough start, ending Day 2 with a 1-2 record, but the team managed to pick themselves up with three straight wins on the final two days to secure their spot in the Pro League with a Top 2 finish in Pool C. There are certainly still some kinks that need ironing out, but they can surely breath a bit easier now knowing that they’ve made it into the League. 9 – Team Reciprocity Tommey and co. managed to blitz through Pool A to earn a spot in the Pro League. This squad filled with some of the best players in Europe finished just 9th-12th at CWL Vegas, but they bounced back in a big way during the Qualifier, locking in a Top 2 spot in Pool A to move into the Pro League. Losses to FC Black and Team Divine derailed what could have been a perfect Pool Play showing from this team, but regardless, they earned a coveted spot in the Pro League and could do some real damage once it gets underway in February. 10 – Evil Geniuses While UYU might have been the first team to secure their spot in the CWL Pro League from Pool D, that didn’t stop Evil Geniuses from coming through in their final game of the day to take the top spot for themselves. A convincing 3-0 sweep over UYU to close out play in Pool D was all they needed to avoid bracket play on the final day and move right into the Pro League. 11 – Enigma6 Enigma6 took the top spot in Pool A to qualify for the Pro League. Even in the midst a Pool A filled with teams like FaZe Clan and Team Reciprocity, Enigma6 managed to come out at the very top with an almost perfect record to boot. Their only loss in six tries came against the aforementioned Reciprocity, but even that was a close 3-2 that could have went either way. With a Pro League spot now locked up, Enigma6 can sit back and watch the playoffs without any worries. 12 – Team Heretics Heretics have defied all the odds and have advanced into the CWL Pro League. With one of the most passionate fanbases in Call of Duty behind them, Team Heretics has managed to qualify for the CWL Pro League with an incredible second-place finish in Pool B. Dropping only a single game all week, to the first-place finishing Team Envy no less, Heretics looks poised to do some major damage once the Pro League kicks off in just a couple of weeks. 13 – Excelerate Gaming After going 3-3 to finish 3rd in Pool C, not many people envisioned that Excelerate Gaming would qualify for the Pro League directly through the Winner’s Bracket. But that’s exactly what happened, as Beehzy, FA5TBALLA, MRuiz, Believe, ProFeeZy got 3-2 victories over Fact Revolution and FaZe Clan before sweeping Team Sween in the qualifying round. 14 – Team Space Arguably the strongest North American team yet to sign with an org, Team Space once again proved themselves by qualifying for the Pro League. After an uncharacteristically tough start to the Qualifier, SpaceLy, MajorManiak, Havok, Maux, and Nagafen scraped a 3-3 record to finish 4th in Pool C and advance to bracket play. They never looked back from there, dominating their way through Tainted Minds (3-0), Red Reserve (3-1), and Mindfreak (3-0). 15 – Red Reserve Although considered by many as the strongest EU team, Red Reserve took the much harder road to qualifying for the CWL Pro League. Their 4-2 record in Pool D was not enough to finish them in the top two, and a 3-1 loss to Team Space in the Winner’s Bracket meant they had to win two straight elimination matches in the Loser’s Bracket. Using their veteran experience, Joee, Rated, Zer0, Skrapz, and Bance did just that, defeating G2 Esports 3-2 and Team Sween 3-1. 16 – Overtime Esports The 16th and final team to qualify for the CWL Pro League is Overtime Esports, who defeated Mindfreak in the final match of the Qualifier tournament to stamp their ticket. The French side finished 3-3 in Pool C to advance to bracket play, although a loss to Team Sween in their lone Winner’s Bracket game meant they needed to win to straight in the Loser’s. That they did, stunning FaZe Clan 3-2 before beating Mindfreak 3-1 to prove that they belong among the top 16 teams in the world. With the 16 teams now confirmed, here’s a look at how they’ll be split into the two Divisions of the Pro League. For more information on the format, schedule and results, don’t forget to check out our post on how to watch the 2019 CWL Pro League Qualifier. You can also follow @DexertoINTEL on Twitter for all you Call of Duty esports needs.

Reports: Call of Duty franchise league spots to cost more than Overwatch League and LCS With franchising coming soon to the Call of Duty esports, publishers Activision Blizzard are reportedly asking for $25 million for a spot in the CWL for the 2020 season. According to ESPN, sources have claimed that Activision already have begun the sales process for this new league, setting the starting price at $25 million per franchise spot. This will be a whopping $5 million more than the reported $20 million starting price for spot in Season 1 of the Overwatch League, the first franchised league owned and operated by Blizzard Entertainment. Another comparison is the franchised League of Legends Championship Series. The North American league reportedly charged prospective teams $10 million to guarantee a spot. According to some familiar with the league negotiations, Activision have been holding meetings over the past week with organizations that may be interested in purchasing a spot, including some that are currently fielding teams in the CWL and/or OWL. As had been previously reported, owners of OWL teams that are interested will get the first right of refusal when it comes to negotiating for their respective home markets. Aside from the price of each spot, not much else has been revealed about the way this new Call of Duty franchise league will work or where the teams will play. The only information that has been confirmed is that the league will kick off in 2020 and will be city-based, much like the OWL, meaning that each team’s branding will be focused around their home city. The implementation of franchising in CoD esports will represent a major restructuring of the current system, which uses a promotion-relegation format. Under the current system, participating in the CWL Pro League is based on qualification, which means that the exact pool of 16 pro teams changes every season based on qualifier tournament results. However, in the franchised league, organizations that have purchased a spot will not have to go through a qualification process every year and will get to hold on to their membership no matter how poorly they may do in the league.

Call of Duty franchise spot could cost double initial Overwatch League price DexertoThe franchising of Call of Duty esports looks to be right around the corner. However, it appears that anyone who is looking get involved will need to pay more than initially reported – with bidding for a spot apparently approaching $40 million. While other competitive titles like Blizzard’s own Overwatch and Riot Games’ League Of Legends have embraced the franchising model – asking for around $20 million and $10/$12 million, respectively – Call of Duty has been left behind the curve despite Activision repeatedly hinting at the possibility. However, in mid-February 2019, it was confirmed by Activision that the game would be shifting to franchises – leaving plenty of questions up in the air about who would be investing in spots and how much they would cost. CWL Franchise price could be increasing An initial report from ESPN stated that Activision Blizzard had reportedly been asking for $25 million per spot in the CWL for the upcoming 2020 season. However, that cost of investment now appears to have changed. According to esports veteran, broadcaster and industry-insider Scott ‘SirScoots’ Smith, that price tag has risen sharply. On April 28, he tweeted: “Based on the OWL Dallas event, unless the process is over, a spot in the CWL is going to get even more expensive. Last I heard the bidding was already close to $40mil a city.” Based on the OWL Dallas event, unless the process is over, a spot in the CWL is going to get even more expensive. Last I heard the bidding was already close to $40mil a city. — Scott Smith (@SirScoots) April 28, 2019 However, ESPN’s Jacob Wolf disputed that figure by reiterating his report that the price stood at $25 million for any investor – be they a new group or a current Overwatch League team owner. The Overwatch League has now begun holding ‘home’ games, and with a massive turnout at the Dallas Fuel’s first home match, the value of the CWL spots could be going up. Team Envy and Dallas Fuel founder Mike ‘Hastr0‘ Rufail posted a video of the team’s home match, boasting about the impressive crowd size. 4-0 Dallas! You guys in the crowd were truly unbelievable. This is just the beginning for the home team @DallasFuel. pic.twitter.com/XjVvSTVSqP — Mike Rufail (@hastr0) April 27, 2019 City-based CoD franchises Details about the upcoming Call of Duty franchised model remain scarce, with no indication about how many teams will be involved, whether or not games will be paid in a single arena like the Overwatch League, or if current rosters will have to break up. One thing for certain is that the teams will be city-based in a similar, if not identical fashion, to how OWL teams are currently operated and branded. Read More: Top 20 highest earning Call of Duty pros – It has been reported that owners of current OWL teams will be able to have the first right of negotiation when it comes to negotiating for their respective home markets – meaning OpTic Gaming and Envy would be able to retain their Houston and Dallas branding. With the Black Ops 4 competitive season in full swing, it remains to be seen just who invests into the Call of Duty franchise league, and just when the finer details will be announced.

‘Call of Duty’ Film Director Reveals How it Will be Different From Other War Movies More information has been revealed regarding the future release of a ‘Call of Duty’ film and how it will differ from other War movies, according to the Director. First announced in 2015 alongside the release of CoD: Black Ops 3, the creation of Activision Blizzard Studios was set to produce films and shows surrounding the various franchises of Activision. Although only one project has been released by the Studio known as ‘Skylanders Academy,’ a Netflix series which began in 2016 and is currently going into its third season, it was always suggested that a ‘Call of Duty’ feature film would be developed with a release date of 2018 or 2019. In February, it was revealed that ‘Sicario: War of the Cartels’ Director Stefano Sollima was connected with the release of a Call of Duty film, which will likely set up a cinematic universe that can be used for future installations. While promoting ‘Sicario: War of the Cartels,’ Sollima also answered questions from ‘/Film,’ a movie blog, in regards to how a CoD film will be different from other war and video game installations from the past. “I think it’s more the idea, the concept of telling the story of a soldier, it’s something you have not seen much, there have been many war movies, but no soldier’s movie.” He later went on to mention how they will need to ‘betray the structure’ and create something that is ‘completely new’ in order to find success with audiences. “I think the movie has to be a totally different experience from any video game, so in order to make a good movie based on a video game, you have to betray the structure. a video game, you have to create something that is completely new and a great movie.” As of writing, it is unknown when such a ‘Call of Duty’ film will be released, or which actors will be involved with the production. Source: /Film

Call of Duty: FaZe Clan and G2 Esports expected to make major roster changes A sudden storm of speculation has swirled in the competitive Call of Duty scene involving potential roster moves for both FaZe Clan and G2 Esports. Following a series of developments that have taken place on December 16, both FaZe and G2 are now expected to make at least one roster change moving forward. For FaZe, the player in question is newcomer Anthony ‘Methodz’ Zinni, who may potentially be replaced with the up-and-comer ‘Cellium,’ who is currently a player for eUnited’s Cadet team. This theory was first fueled when the team rosters for Sunday’s CMG ProDown Black Ops 4 tournament were revealed, and Cellium was listed on the FaZe roster instead of Methodz. However, there was no question about Methodz’s availability for the tournament, as the former OpTic Gaming player was shown to be playing with G2 Esports’ roster in place of Richard ‘Ricky’ Stacy, who instead played with another team that featured former World Champion ‘MiRx.’ Another huge sign of things to come was this cryptic tweet put out by Ricky on December 16, a major hint that he may well be on his way out. The speculation was fueled even further when Methodz and G2 founder and CEO Carlos ‘Ocelote’ Rodriguez Santiago began following each other on Twitter on December 16, the same day the ProDown began. If any announcements of changes are to be made, they probably won’t happen until December 24, which is when Cellium turns 18 years of age and earns eligibility to play in the CoD World League. Read More: Hilarious fan made parody video shows OpTic’s Crimsix interviewing with MMA fighter Conor McGregor – While many may not expect FaZe and G2 to make roster moves this early into the season, it doesn’t come as a major surprise, considering that both teams heavily under-performed at the recent $250,000 CWL Vegas event. Pool C favorites FaZe Clan finished third in the group and 13-16th overall, the same placement that G2 earned while going a horrid 0-4 to finish bottom of Pool D.

Call of Duty fans fear H2M mod will get shut down as sales skyrocket ActivisionGiven Activision’s history of shutting down fan-made projects, Call of Duty fans fear H2M will suffer the same fate. H2M is an upcoming mod that recreates Modern Warfare 2 (2009) multiplayer. The fan project was created on Call of Duty: Modern Warfare Remastered and recreates every iconic map and weapon. Before the official August 16 release, some content creators were given early access. Impressive early gameplay footage generated a large wave of buzz. Coincidentally, Modern Warfare Remastered is currently half off on Steam, which helped make it the third best-selling game on Steam before the mod went live. Before getting too excited, previous precedents from Activision proved there was reason to be concerned about the project’s future, and that was expressed on Twitter. In May 2023, Activision shocked the CoD community by sending a cease-and-desist letter to the Sm2 developers, who had spent over a year creating a free-to-play mod using the MW2019 engine. During that same month, Activision also forced X Labs to shut down as it hosted servers for previous titles such as Black Ops 3. Seasoned veterans know all too well what can happen in the blink of an eye and are cautious. “Not buying it till it launches in case it gets shut down,” one player responded. “Why do people even waste their time on making these? I have never seen one last longer than two weeks,” a second user added. A Steam sale coincidentally slashing Modern Warfare Remastered’s price in half a few days before H2M’s release raised suspicions over Activision’s intentions. “Activision is staying quiet right now so they could get those MWR Steam sales just so they could take down the mod after it releases,” a third commentator speculated. If you want to get in on the action while it’s still available, check out our guide on how to play H2M.

Call of Duty fans divided over jet packs ever making a return Sledgehammer GamesModernWarzone asked Call of Duty fans if they would ever want jetpacks to make a return, and community members couldn’t come to an agreement. Advanced Warfare marked the beginning of a new era for COD with the introduction of exo-suits (jet packs). Sledgehammer Games’ first crack at developing a COD title caught flack for fundamentally changing movement mechanics, yet inspired a wave of other jet pack titles, including Black Ops 3, Infinite Warfare, and Black Ops 4. The COD community collectively celebrated boots-on-the-ground gameplay returning in Modern Warfare 2019. But it’s now been five years since the last jet pack title, and some fans have turned a new leaf on the once-maligned movement feature. FaZe Zooma recently hosted a Black Ops 3 tournament featuring Call of Duty League pros. OpTic Gaming star Dashy heralded BO3 as “the peak of COD” after playing, and other community members shared a similar sentiment while watching jet packs in action. Call of Duty community members question place for jet packs With Black Ops 3 briefly returning to the spotlight, ModernWarzone asked: “Should jetpacks make a return in Call of Duty.” Sledgehammer already confirmed MW3 won’t bring back jet packs. But the question still stands for any future series entry. Video game insider Tom Henderson responded: “Wouldn’t mind a jetpack COD every 5-6 years tbh. Makes for an interesting change and would be a nice change in Warzone.” Another user suggested that each COD developer focus on a different specialty: “IW focus on modern boots on the ground games, Treyarch focus on historical boots on the ground games, and Sledgehammer focus on futuristic and mechanically experimental games.” On the other side of the aisle, a third commenter argued: “No, they already ruined the game once.” According to leaks, Call of Duty 2025 will remaster Black Ops 2 maps, nullifying this debate for a few years.

Call of Duty fans demand a remaster for decade-old favorite game ActivisionCall of Duty fans joined in agreement that they would love to see the classic game CoD World at War remastered. Call of Duty is a historied franchise, that has grown to be one of the most popular casual and esport FPS games, featuring thrilling campaigns and their own league – the CDL. Activision has made a habit of issuing an annual release, rotating between developers like Infinity Ward, Sledgehammer Games, Raven Software, and Treyarch, each adding their own unique style to the game. Players have looked forward to new releases of Call of Duty, and recently Activision has focused on offering new iterations of the Modern Warfare series – such as the upcoming release Modern Warfare 3 (2023). With all these remasters of old games, players have been thinking about what other Call of Duty’s they would like to see released with a modern flair – games like the classic World at War, which was initially brought out over a decade ago in 2008. Call of Duty community would love new World at War One content creator spurred a wave of support within the community for a remaster of World at War with a post reminiscing about the old game: “World at War is one of the best Call of Duty games. We need it remastered.” Some were overjoyed at the thought of a remaster of World at War, claiming it to be arguably one of the greatest CoD titles: “This is absolutely a fact! One of the best CoD titles released overall.” However, not everyone was so keen, and one person was quick to remind everyone of a game that was based in a similar time era, Vanguard, which was not received well by the community: “We did they called it Vanguard.” But, while many wouldn’t be opposed to the idea, they rather have their attention focused on the new game Modern Warfare 3 that will soon be released and the issues they worry could plague that game – like spam reports and “excessive SBMM.”

Warzone fans delighted as leaks reveal first look at returning Rebirth Island map ActivisionCall of Duty fans are shouting from the rooftops following a new leak that indicates the classic Rebirth Island map will be returning to the franchise. Call of Duty has some of the most dedicated fans across the whole video game industry. With multiple games and a competitive multiplayer community, fans are always providing feedback to the devs to ensure each and every CoD title is as good as it can be. Given the long history of the CoD franchise, a great way for the devs to reinvigorate excitement in their fans is to reintroduce old maps to new titles, with these classic locations often reworked or updated for maximum excitement. The most recent classic map to be teased as entering the CoD world once again is the beloved Rebirth Island. In a new Reddit thread, one player uploaded a leaked image of the map that was found within the code of Modern Warfare 3 and Warzone. This leak indicates that Rebirth Island will arrive at some point throughout 2024, most likely during the upcoming season 4. While the exact release of Rebirth Island is unknown, one thing is for certain. Fans are excited about the chance to once again return to the map. In the same Reddit thread that revealed the leaked image, players were flocking to the comments to share their thoughts on the news. One CoD player wrote, “F**k yes. It looks exactly the same.” Another added, “This is gonna be nice. Like visiting your childhood house again. It’s much smaller than I remember yup you’re all grown up now buddy. I hope they have vault stuff and easter eggs from the get-go. Did you guys have favorite landing spots?” The same CoD fan added, “we did the vaults sooooo many times. Did whatever was needed and headed to a vault, sometimes all of them. Tight battles in the prison area to get that phone to ring and to get those numbers”. Time will tell when Rebirth Island does make its way to MW3 and Warzone. However, we’ll be sure to keep you updated on when you’ll be able to dive back into this cult classic location.

Call of Duty fans debate which character should get their own game ActivisionFans of Call of Duty are in a heated discussion about which campaign characters they think are deserving of their own game. Despite being known mostly for its multiplayer component, the Call of Duty game series has had a few colorful characters in its single player campaigns that have stuck with players. Some of these much-loved characters have lasted throughout multiple entries in the franchise due to their popularity. Fans have begun to debate which of these characters have the potential – or at least, pure love from the community – to have their own solo game made about them. Call of Duty fans want to know which characters deserve their own game The discussion began on Reddit, where a user made a post titled, “If you could give any COD character their own game, which character should it be?” The post was accompanied with an image of Reznov, a popular character from Treyarch’s World at War and Black Ops series. One user agreed with the post, saying they’d love to have a full Soviet-centered campaign about Reznov instead of “… just 1 mission from BO1.” A few other users have voiced their desire for a game about Hudson, another popular character from the Black Ops series who served as Alex Mason’s handler. Despite being a prominent presence in every Black Ops game, many players feel that there is unexplored territory for the character that could work out to be an interesting game. Another user mentioned Captain MacMillan from Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. MacMillan was only in two missions in the campaign, but they were two of the best-loved missions in the franchise. Other players are wanting one about Ghost, everyone’s favorite masked character from the original and current Modern Warfare games.

Call of Duty fans brutally mock out-of-date TWD crossover for Season 2 AMCThe Walking Dead finally graces CoD with Season 2 of MW3 and Warzone. However, the reveal of protagonist Rick Grimes has led to some brutal roasts due to how dated it feels. Season 1 is coming to a close in MW3 and Warzone, with some of the highlights being another crossover with The Boys, Warzone, MW3’s integration, and Ranked Play, albeit via a midseason update. Season 2 is right around the corner, and trying to stir up the hype train, Activision has released key art for the upcoming season, which features a look at The Walking Dead protagonist, Rick Grimes. While Rick’s appearance did garner some hype, it also opened the doors for many roasts at how dated the crossover feels. MW3 & Warzone Season 2 introduce The Walking Dead collab The Walking Dead garnered a ton of success during its televised run, debuting in 2010 and ending in 2022. Rumors have floated around for some time that The Walking Dead would join CoD, and MW3 Season 2 delivers said rumors. To say the arrival of Rick Grimes in CoD feels dated is a light way of putting it, and after Activision pulled back the curtain, players on MW3’s official subreddit let the team know exactly how they felt. “Crossover so late I might as well expect Walter White to show up sometime,” one Reddit user said. Important to note that Michonne will also join as part of the upcoming Season 2 crossover, most likely as a way to capitalize on the upcoming series, The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live. Some of the comments shared hype for the crossover and the show. However, the majority of the comments brutally shared how dated this feels. “Someone at AMC was handed a blank check to convince these companies that a TWD crossover is a cool idea,” another Reddit use said. Season 2 of MW3 and Warzone is expected to launch on February 7, 2024.

Call of Duty fans argue the worst ever CoD game ActivisionWhich Call of Duty game is the best? Which CoD game is the worst? It’s a popular argument that continues to rage on and players have offered their thoughts on the intense debate. Some people believe that the Call of Duty franchise really got a fire lit under it with Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, a game that revolutionized the FPS genre with its deep Multiplayer system. Now, in 2022, we’ve had 19 official, mainline CoD games, and there are daily debates about which one is the best, and which one should be discarded and thrown to the bottom of the pile. A viral Twitter trend has seen lots of heated discussion about the topic and it’s led to many very interesting responses. Which COD game is the best and worst? A poll conducted by CharlieINTEL got the ball rolling by posing several questions to their followers: “First played Call of Duty, Most recent Call of Duty, Best Call of Duty, Worst Call of Duty.” The questions got a response from a whole host of names from regular Twitter followers to pros and even content creators. FaZe Blaze said his favorite was Black Ops 2 before condemning Infinite Warfare as the worst. Popular Call of Duty YouTuber, aptly named TBAG, chimed in and said that the legendary follow-up to CoD4 – Modern Warfare 2 – was his favorite and claimed that CoD: WW2 is the worst. The WW2 sentiment was also shared by another YouTuber – RaidAway- who put the game as his worst as well, instead opting for BLOPS3 as his favorite. It was fascinating to see just how many players had opted for Vanguard as their worst CoD game, although the fallout from the recent 2022 CDL season finale combined with recency bias will likely have a lot to do with this. As for the best game, there was a ton of love for COD4, MW2, Black Ops 1, Black Ops 2, and Black Ops 3, but with nothing truly definitive to separate them all. It seems with every subsequent CoD game the debate gets deeper thanks to a new game but takes us further away from ever truly finding out the answer, and we expect Modern Warfare 2 will only stir things up even more. You can check out our list of the best Call of Duty games ever here, so see if our list matches up with yours!

Call of Duty fans are losing their minds over MW2 reveal trailer Activision released the official reveal trailer for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 and it has sent CoD fans into frenzied anticipation. Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 officially releases on October 28. Modern Warfare 2 is a sequel to the highly successful Modern Warfare (2019) and brings back the original campaign cast way back from Modern Warfare 2 released in 2009. The reveal trailer gave fans a sneak peek at the new Modern Warfare 2 campaign and may have hinted at locations for other game modes such as Warzone 2. As expected with any large trailer reveal, fans shared their instant reactions and also began to break down the video pixel by pixel trying to decipher any easter eggs or clues. Modern Warfare 2 Reveal Trailer Call of Duty tweeted out the official reveal trailer on June 8, and as of writing this the trailer already has accumulated 1.6 million views on Twitter. The response to the trailer has been overwhelmingly positive from fans and CoD content creators. One of the biggest names in CoD, TimTheTatman commented and said “no fall damage” with the prayer hands in reference to the running joke of the streamer constantly dying in Warzone to fall damage. Was Warzone 2 leaked in the trailer? Call of Duty insider Tom Henderson stated, “Infinity Ward has already teased the Warzone 2 map in the Modern Warfare 2 trailer.” Henderson also included a crude map of the possible Warzone 2 map, with fans chiming in as to possible landmarks from previous CoD games that might appear. Fun fact, Infinity Ward has already teased the #Warzone2 map in the #ModernWarfare2 trailer 🙂 pic.twitter.com/z8lkUFrUUj — Tom Henderson (@_Tom_Henderson_) June 8, 2022 For instance, Optic Gaming Twitter account made an interesting observation from the trailer that may hint at a return of the fan-favorite Highrise map from Modern Warfare 2. Interestingly there is no crane in sight from the screenshot, however. None of the information about Warzone 2 has confirmed, but the trailer has members of the Call of Duty community excited, and who could blame them after watching the reveal trailer. For more Modern Warfare 2 exclusive stories, check these out: MW2 world reveal trailer | EMP gets rework in MW2 | Lethal AI bots coming to Warzone & MW2 | Campaign details revealed | Water rework for MW2 & Warzone maps | New Multiplayer default classes | Major Gunsmith changes | 5 Multiplayer maps confirmed | New MW2 equipment | How to pre-order Modern Warfare 2 | Anti-cheat for MW2

Call of Duty fans are in love with new Dragon Slayer skin in Black Ops 4 Black Ops 4 players have been critical of the skins which can be unlocked through the black market system, but some of the new additions in the ‘Absolute Zero’ event have impressed the community. When Black Ops 4 launched on October 12, microtransactions were non-existent, but soon after, the black market was added, with an entirely new system, not seen before in Call of Duty. Taking notes from Fortnite’s battle pass, players will progress through tiers, simply by playing, and unlocking a new item at every tier – of course you can also buy tiers too, costing precious COD Points. However, fans were not happy with many of the items, with tiers cluttered full of ‘stickers’ and ’emotes’, a few rather unflattering skins, and very scarcely were there any weapon camos or variants over the full 200 tiers. With Absolute Zero now live, so is a new set of tiers (only 100 this time), and some of the new skins available are much more intriguing, as well as unlocking weapon camos more frequently and earlier in the tier progression. One skin that has caught players attention specifically is the ‘Dragon Slayer’ outfit for Firebreak, which looks like its something out of a medieval game, not a futuristic military shooter. Heaps of praise was given to this new skin, available at tier 65, particularly on Reddit – which can at times be the most vocal and negative community. Another post called the skin the “Coolest shit I’ve ever seen”, and user RTCJOK3R replied, echoing the sentiments of many: Dude those 100 Tiers all have really cool stuff in them, I’m glad that Muertos skin are finally gone. Weapons, camos, really great skins..that’s the Black Market i wanted. And bringing the Tiers down from 200 to 100 is another great move. In addition to the new items in the regular tiers, players can also choose to tack on another set of tiers to work through called ‘Special Orders’, which reward players with specific character skins and a set of calling cards. More: Black Ops 4: Full breakdown of the THREE new weapons added to Multiplayer and Blackout – Daemon 3XB, SWAT RFT, and Secret Santa – These Special Orders rotate, typically every 48 hours, incentivizing players to buy them before they disappear – again taking a leaf out of Fortnite’s book and its daily item shop.

Call of Duty fan goes viral after perfectly recreating weapon sounds gamerkidd111 / Infinity Ward[jwplayer bvPiezuD] A young Call of Duty fan has gone viral for recreating Modern Warfare and Warzone’s gun noises to an insanely accurate degree, to the point where it sounds like it’s taken straight from the game. Despite all the controversies with hackers, bugs, and just general complaints, there’s no denying that Modern Warfare and Warzone have some top-notch details. From bolts on guns locking open when they should to characters making different sounds depending on how and where they are running, the developers’ attention to detail has been widely praised. One such aspect that’s caught the most attention are the weapon sounds; each firearm emits distinct and realistic noises that are unique to that gun, such as when they’re shot or the bullet casings hitting the ground. Read more: How to fly and glide further in Warzone – All that said, it’s not difficult to capture that sort of audio from the weapons’ real-life counterparts. What is difficult, however, is trying to realistically imitate those sounds using simply your mouth and voice. That’s exactly what Call of Duty fan ‘gamerkidd111’ seems to be able to do, as he somehow perfectly recreated weapon sounds in a TikTok video he recently published that’s since gone viral. The video, which has generated almost 3 million views on the platform, features gamerkidd111 making noises of several Modern Warfare guns, such as the grenade launcher, RPG, MP5, shotgun, and deagle handgun. To say these sounds are hyper-realistic would be an understatement as the fan not only got the weapon firing sounds right but also other details like bullets hitting the ground and the various rounds traveling through the air. Given how hard it probably is to do this so accurately, some have expressed doubts about whether all the sounds in the video are actually emitted by him, especially the incredibly on-point effect of the casings falling out of the chamber. But, it seems enough people believe the fan to have carried his video into the rarified air of viral social media posts and it’s hard to blame them; it’s clear that he definitely has talent. Hopefully, the popularity of this clip will inspire gamerkidd111 to make more videos putting his skills on display, because there’s no doubt that he has more under his sleeve.

Call of Duty fan creates amazing Black Ops 4 weapon camos based on CWL pro players MLG / @vLionManAs the current Call of Duty World League season nears its halfway mark, one dedicated fan has created weapon camos in Black Ops 4 based on pro players and teams. Over the past few months, since the start of the CWL season, New Zealand based design student ‘LionMan’ has gained notoriety on social media thanks to his CoD esports content. His work first started to pick up traction several months ago when he began designing and posting CWL trading cards on Twitter, each featuring pro player or teams and their corresponding statistics, some of which he also came up with. In addition to each players’ base card, LionMan also created different sets of cards commemorating major tournament victories, memorable achievements, and even intense rivalries, with each set featuring its own spectacular design. One example of these trading cards would be this set dedicated to Luminosity Gaming’s victory at the recent CWL Fort Worth tournament, with Gunless receiving a special version having been named event MVP. CWL Fort Worth Pro Cards – @Luminosity (Champions) MVP @i2Gunless Champion @FormaL Champion @Slacked Champion @Classic Champion @LG_J0hn pic.twitter.com/CT4rnrJDAV— McGregor | Lion :lion_face: (@vLionMan) March 20, 2019 Now, LionMan has taken his designing skills into Black Ops 4 itself, putting in the time and effort to create amazing in-game weapon camos honoring certain players and teams that are currently in the CWL. If the cards hadn’t already caught enough fans’ attention, these weapon camos certainly have, with hundreds paying their compliments to LionMan for his incredible work. Mathew ‘FormaL’ Piper – Luminosity Gaming Peirce ‘Gunless’ Hillman – Luminosity Gaming (CWL Fort Worth MVP Edition) Seth ‘Scump’ Abner – OpTic Gaming Brandon ‘Dashy’ Otell – OpTic Gaming (CWL Vegas MVP Edition) Kenny ‘Kenny’ Williams – 100 Thieves Preston ‘Priestahh’ Greiner – 100 Thieves Michael ‘MajorManiak’ Szymaniak – Gen.G Patrick ‘ACHES’ Price – Team Envy James ‘Clayster’ Eubanks – eUnited Dillon ‘Attach’ Price – Evil Geniuses There are a lot more awesome weapon skins that LionMan has created and posted images of in addition to the ones above, so make sure to check those out by visiting his Twitter page. As expected, upon seeing these designs, many fans have began begging Treyarch to add something similar to Black Ops 4, as CWL-themed cosmetics have been popular in the past few CoD titles. However, no mention or announcement has been on that topic, so whether or not esports weapon camos will eventually be added to Black Ops 4 remains unclear at this point.

Call of Duty fan concept suggests perfect changes to the Blackout map layout tr7272Call of Duty: Black Ops 4’s Blackout battle royale mode has been a big hit the community since the game was released in October, but there’s always room for improvement. One of the many things that Treyarch did right with their first attempt at a battle royale title was to play into the nostalgia of Call of Duty’s core fanbase with various maps from previous Treyarch games implemented into the much larger Blackout map. But one fan thinks the time has come to add even more of those classic points of interest and we have to admit that some of them have completely captured our emotion! Reddit user ‘tr7272’ submitted a post titled ‘Would you guys like it if Treyarch added some (not all) of these maps?’ and we’re immediately drawn to the two locations that have been added to the ocean in the attached image. While we would have absolutely no complaints if any of the suggestions were added, the idea of landing on Carrier or Hijacked and getting some great loot before risking the treacherous crossing back to the mainland seems pretty damn cool! Hijacked and Carrier were both popular multiplayer maps in Black Ops 2. Hijacked was set on a huge, luxurious yacht, while Carrier saw players battling on a Chinese aircraft carrier. Read More: November 9 update for Black Ops 4 includes stability improvements in Zombies and more Blackout balancing – The idea of classic Zombies maps like Der Riese or Kino de Toten is also pretty appealing, especially considering the fact that Blackout already features its fair share of the undead monsters. It seems likely that Treyarch left space in the Blackout map for this exact purpose and that classic maps will continue to be added, or removed, throughout the year and beyond. For now, though, we can only imagine what those additions might be.

Call of Duty execs reportedly considering shift away from annual releases ActivisionCall of Duty executives are reportedly thinking about moving away from annual releases of the FPS following poor Vanguard sales. After Microsoft’s purchase of Activision Blizzard, many question marks have popped up revolving around Call of Duty. Many questioned if the game will remain on PlayStation or if the franchise would become Xbox-exclusive. While the company did confirm their plans to keep CoD on PlayStation, some wonder if it’s a stunt to get GamePass on the platform. Among other things, new information has now surfaced revealing what could be a huge step for the shooter. The latest claims suggest that the next CoD could be the final annual release for the franchise as the company shifts their focus to one game. Call of Duty could move away from yearly releases after Vanguard struggles In a report by Bloomberg, it is said that CoD could no longer be a yearly release. “High-level employees at Activision have discussed moving away from the annual release schedule.” This debate has sparked internally following the release of the latest title Call of Duty: Vanguard, which “saw a 36% decline from 2020’s entry in U.K. sales charts.” The belief appears to be that if the first-person shooter is released at a slower pace then fans will enjoy the game more. There have also been many problems with Vanguard that haven’t been resolved in the quickest time frame. If they move away from annual releases, the devs could get Call of Duty into a state that players enjoy both casually and competitively. On the competitive side, a move like this could benefit the CDL as popular esports like League of Legends, CS:GO, and Valorant are all updated instead of swapping titles every year. However, it was also reported that the change may not happen until next year or later. This means that 2022’s rumored Modern Warfare 2 will likely not be the CoD that fans are playing for the next couple of years. At the time of writing this, nothing has been made official by Activision. We will update you when more information is provided, in the meantime check out the Call of Duty page for all the latest news.

Call of Duty: Ex-Revenge team announce organization for CWL Pro League Qualifier The former Team Revenge Call of Duty lineup has revealed their new organization after leaving their old team on December 12. Saul ‘Parzelion’ Masse-Siguenza, Carson ‘Brack’ Newberry and Eric ‘JetLi’ Phan where part of the Team Revenge squad that competed at CWL Las Vegas in early December 2018. The team went on to finish in the Top 24 of the event, earning 2,750 pro points, and securing their place in the CWL Pro League Qualifier on January 16. With the trio leaving Team Revenge, they have now hooked up with former Regal Reserve player Devin ‘LlamaGod’ Tran to join Dylan ‘Envoy’ Hannon at Midnight Esports. The former Midnight Esports lineup finished Top 40 at CWL Las Vegas, just missing out on the Top 28 placing required to earn a spot in the Pro League Qualifiers, while LlamaGod’s Regal Reserve team placed the same. LlamaGod is the most recognizable name on the new Midnight Esports roster, previously competing for Gone Gaming towards the end of the World War 2 season, and was also part of a Ghost Gaming lineup that included Michael ‘SpaceLy’ Schmale and Andres ‘Lacefield’ Lacefield. Midnight Esports would like to announce our Call of Duty roster going into the Pro League Qualifier @LlamaGod @DylanEnvoy @Parzelion @BrackCN @ERlCJET pic.twitter.com/0vNW7rFCtm — Midnight Esports (@GGMidnight_) December 26, 2018 The new Midnight Esports roster will make their first appearance on LAN at the CWL Pro League Qualifier, as 24 teams go head to head in an attempt to stake their claim to one of the final twelve spaces in the Pro League, which kicks off in February. Midnight Esports will also be in attendance at the next Call of Duty open event in Fort Worth, Florida on March 15.

Call of Duty: Enable hits out at fans who question 100 Thieves’ attitudes 100 Thieves professional Call of Duty player Ian ‘Enable’ Wyatt has responded to fans who have questioned his team and their attitude when playing. 100T were scrimming Michael ‘SpaceLy’ Schmale’s former Str8 Rippin squad on the Control mode but decided they wanted to practice Hardpoint and started to search for a new scrim while messing around and having fun in their current map. This led members of Maurice ‘Fero’ Henriquez’s chat to question their decision to mess around, with some saying that this kind of behavior was the reason they finished in a disappointing 9th-12th place at CWL Las Vegas. Enable took issue with this, and the overall conduct of the chat, which had previously called out the 100 Thieves line up for arguing too much during practice. “All of you who do that, that’s a cancerous attitude. Fix your attitude, stated Wyatt. “Be more positive.” Read More: Popular CoD content creator announced as part of OpTic Gaming in Vision episode “These fools get pissed because we argue with each other, and then when we’re having fun they want to know why we aren’t arguing! We can’t win with you all, just have fun.” Many Call of Duty fans had high hopes for this 100 Thieves lineup heading into Black Ops 4, but even owner Matt ‘Nadeshot’ Haag admitted he was disappointed with the team’s placement at CWL Las Vegas. Nadeshot still has faith in the squad however, saying that he believes: “we are going to be a top two team on paper, and a top two team in this game.” 100 Thieves will hope to improve ahead of the CWL Pro League Qualifiers on January 16, when they will do battle against 27 other teams to secure their spot in the competition.

Call of Duty Dream Team: What’s the best CoD roster of all time? Dexerto Throwing the best players from different eras together to make dream teams is always a good debate, no matter the sport (or esport). But what would your all-time Call of Duty dream team look like? The annual release cycle of Call of Duty titles means that even the very best players can see their talents vary year on year. Sam ‘Octane’ Larew, who proved himself as one of the best in the world at Black Ops 4, has struggled with both Modern Warfare and Black Ops Cold War. Naturally, CoD fans like to conceive of teams that could have been, even if the chronology doesn’t quite pan out. How would Infinite Warfare FormaL and WWII Kenny done together? We’ll never know, but it’s fun to think about. Here, Pacman, Enable and Katie Bedford go over their dream teams, combining some of the most dominant players with one another. What would your dream team look like? Discover More: Are Atlanta FaZe the new OpTic Dynasty?

Call of Duty DLC Map Valkyrie Available Free for a Limited Time on CoD: WWII Sledgehammer Games, developer of Call of Duty: WWII have announced that DLC map ‘Valkyrie’ will be free for all players over the weekend of May 25-29th. As part of their most recent ‘Weekly Community Update‘ on May 22nd, Sledgehammer announced they would give fans who have not yet purchased the initial resistance DLC map pack a taster of the content. Valkyrie was also added to the CWL official map set shortly after its release into the game, but was not made available in ranked play, due to it being locked in as part of the DLC pack. More: Clayster Makes Some Bold Claims About the New OpTic and Luminosity Gaming Call of Duty Rosters – However the map is a fan favorite, offering more close quarters and fast paced action than the majority of base maps, taking its likeness from the ‘Detroit’ map in Sledgehammer’s previous CoD title, Advanced Warfare. Although the map was not officially confirmed as a remake – unlike another DLC map ‘Occupation’, which is a confirmed remake of the MW3 map ‘Resistance’ – but it certainly resembles Detroit’s layout closely. Valkyrie Open Access Weekend. That’s right, folks. Free, for a limited time from 10AM PDT this Friday until 10AM PDT on May 29, enjoy Valkyrie with your friends. You don’t have to own DLC Pack 1 to play, so make sure to try it before time runs out! In addition to the free open access to Valkyrie, SHG have also added a Valkyrie only playlist which will boost player’s progress with Double XP, Double Weapon XP and Double Division XP. It is unknown currently if the map will also be available in Ranked Play, for those who are yet to experience Valkyrie on 4v4 Hardpoint and S&D with the competitive ruleset. You can download Valkyrie for free starting 10am PDT on Friday May 25th, but if you do not own the Resistance DLC pack, you will only have until the same time on Monday 29th to enjoy it.

Call of Duty devs troll TimTheTatman after “porterhouse” Ashika Island joke YouTube: TimTheTatmanTimTheTatman is one of the biggest streamers in the gaming world and the Call of Duty developers brilliantly trolled him for saying that the upcoming Ashika Island Warzone 2 map looks like “a porterhouse steak.” TimTheTatman’s relationship with Call of Duty has largely been a positive one. Even when the mega-streamer speaks critically of the franchise, he’s quick to acknowledge that it comes from a place of love. When looking over the new Warzone 2 Resurgence map Ashika Island, Tim commented that the map reminded him of a porterhouse steak and the Call of Duty social team wasted no time capitalizing on the moment. TimTheTatman receives steaks from Call of Duty team after Ashika Island comments The streamer shared the big moment on his Twitter account, showing off the full haul from the CoD team. The gift bundle contained three porterhouse steaks along with a Warzone 2.0 branding iron to mark the hefty mounds of meat. “Call of Duty sent me porterhouse steaks and some sort of steak branding thing that I don’t even know how to use. I gotta cook these up, man, to a nice medium,” he said. He followed that up by documenting the process and showing off the final product when he was done. “That’s not too shabby, if I do say so myself.” Call of Duty rounded off the saga by calling the food “an Oganikku Farms exclusive” and letting Tim know they’ll see him on the Island. Warzone Season 2 drops on February 15 and while there might not be any free steaks, there will be a brand new Resurgence mode and a clean wipe for DMZ.

Call of Duty devs respond to hilarious Cold-Blooded Warzone hat glitch Infinity WardA developer from Infinity Ward couldn’t help but comment on a wild new bug popping up in Warzone that’s forcing player’s headwear to betray them while using the Cold-Blooded perk. As most Call of Duty vets are aware, the Cold-Blooded perk keeps your character invisible from things like thermal scopes on weapons and UAV scans, making it perfect for all those stealthy players out there. However, a new glitch appears to be making players accessories, such as their hats, betray them when they should be completely invisible to scanners. How can a hat betray a player using Cold-Blooded though? It’s a valid question, since hats and accessories themselves shouldn’t be giving off any additional heat. But that’s exactly what happened to Reddit user SoupFocus during a Warzone match. In their screenshot, it clearly shows that the player using Cold-Blooded doesn’t show up, but his cowboy hat sure does. The player in the sights of the thermal scope blends in with the background, like you should when using the perk, but his headwear obviously didn’t get the message and sticks out like a sore thumb. Even worse, since their hat is the thing lighting up, it gives any player that has them within range a perfect opportunity at a headshot – if they have a thermal scope of course. SoupFocus’s post about the hilarious glitch even caught the attention of Infinity Ward developer Joel ‘artpeasant’ Emslie, who confirmed it is indeed a bug. “It’s bugged,” Emslie responded simply, which hopefully means that devs are aware of the problem and working on a fix. For now, it’s unknown whether or not the bug is caused by different headgear, so if you plan on going the stealthy route, you may want to customize your operator to have the least amount possible, for now at least. Exactly when developers will roll out a fix for this annoying, yet entertaining bug remains to be seen. For now though, if you see a mysterious floating hat through your scope, it might be worth taking a shot at.

Call of Duty devs finally respond to fury over SBMM in Modern Warfare 3 ActivisionActivision has released a statement, finally addressing the skill-based matchmaking experience that Call of Duty players have become increasingly frustrated with over time, especially now in Modern Warfare 3. Skill-based matchmaking, or SBMM, has been present in multiplayer games for many years now, as developers seek to pit players of similar skill levels against one another. However, many players have complained that it’s become increasingly stronger year on year, and has been a key complaint about Modern Warfare 3 despite generally positive sentiment from the playerbase. Now, after years of speculation and Activision not speaking on the topic, they’ve published a statement. Call of Duty statement on SBMM Call of Duty has finally broken its silence around matchmaking and whether SBMM actually affects the games players get into. The statement reads: “We know there is a lot of interest in the matchmaking experience, especially around how skill contributes to how lobbies and matches are put together. Nothing is more important to us than the experience players have with the game, and matchmaking is a big part of that. We’ve been working on our matchmaking system for well over ten years, and we continue to spend a ton of time and energy on improving the matchmaking process. This involves people working at our Call of Duty studios, our backend services teams at Demonware, and other groups like our Player Insights team. “It’s a large effort that we’ve worked on for many years, and our approach combines latency, search time, and skill, along with many other factors, to try to find the best match experience for you. Talking about this topic in detail can be hard, and we haven’t spent the time to pull together all of our work to share with you our insights and improvements over the many years. We’re looking forward to doing that in the coming weeks after Season 1 launches, and we’ll also make it a part of our ongoing discussions with the community.” The promise to have “ongoing discussions” with the community regarding matchmaking will no doubt be music to many players’ ears, though many will have hoped to hear that they will work on improving the matchmaking experience or at least directly address SBMM.

Call of Duty devs finally explain skill-based matchmaking ActivisionIt’s been two months since Activision promised to finally address matchmaking in CoD, a hot topic for years. In a new post, developers shared insight into how the multiplayer matchmaking system works. For the past few years, skill-based matchmaking has been a controversial CoD debate, as players have shifted away from the title due to how punishing putting players in sweaty lobbies has become. MW3‘s been no different, as social media has been ablaze with claims of punishing matchmaking as soon as the game arrived. Seeing the feedback, back in November 2023, the developers shared an official statement briefly summarizing how the system works. The statement ended by stating that more information would arrive in the coming weeks, with the developers promising to share additional insight. After two months, the developers have finally assembled and shared what fans have been waiting for with “Call of Duty’s Matchmaking Intel.” CoD devs explain multiplayer matchmaking system To preface, the message shared only covers the multiplayer portion of CoD. The developers mention other modes will be covered at a later date. When it comes to CoD’s multiplayer matchmaking, there are two key factors the system takes into account — connection (Ping is King) and time to match (how long it takes to get into a match). There are also smaller critical factors that are taken into account such as platform played, input, recent maps/modes, and skill. Regarding connection, the developers employ a metric known as “Delta Ping,” which is “the difference in round trip time of the data between your best data center” and “the data center onto which your lobby has been placed.” CoD’s netcode tries to mitigate the effects of latency, but in some cases, it can’t completely do that, impacting the feel of a match. On the other hand, the developers explain time to match, the time spent waiting for a match, is impacted by players backing in and out of lobbies. Using Rustment as an example, if a player backs out of a lobby, it creates a process of backfilling, harming the overall experience as the system tries to fill the empty lobby. The big point of the article was measuring skill, which Call of Duty does take into account when matchmaking, considering deaths, score, and performance. They’ve run tests without this system in place, but the data showed player retention was significantly lower. The post also goes on to debunk common myths such as AI in multiplayer or hit-based changes aka “skill-based damage” of which the developers state neither exists in-game. Future updates will continue to explain how the system, including an upcoming “Ping and Matchmaking white paper” that will provide more granular information.

Call of Duty devs explain why series doesn’t yet have a Halo Forge-style map editor ActivisionCall of Duty developers at Infinity Ward have broken silence on the idea of introducing an official map editor for the franchise, explaining in an exclusive interview with Dexerto why it hasn’t become a reality just yet. As one of the longest-running gaming franchises in the world, with 19 mainline titles spanning the past two decades, we’ve certainly seen no shortage of map designs in Call of Duty over the years. Though even with dozens of options available and new layouts always just around the corner given the swap to a seasonal model, fans have long been asking for a map editor all the same. The opportunity to dive in and tweak existing elements or craft wholly original battlegrounds from scratch is nothing new to the FPS genre. From Halo’s iconic Forge to mod tools back in CoD’s formative years, we’ve seen some truly great community creations come from these modes. Yet Activision’s FPS juggernaut is yet to formally implement a consumer-friendly toolkit for fans to run wild with. Despite years of rumors and various leaks from supposed insiders claiming it’s on the way, an official map editing feature has never come to fruition in CoD. But why is that? Well, in speaking with two senior members of Infinity Ward’s multiplayer team – who ironically got their start by using those earlier CoD tools – we gleaned some insight on what’s holding them back from releasing a CoD map editor. Why the CoD series doesn’t have a map editor yet “It’s something dear to our hearts,” Multiplayer Design Director Geoff Smith said on the subject with a smile, revealing he and fellow colleague Joseph Cecot both largely got hired due to their efforts with earlier CoD tools. “But it’s tough because the game is… It would take a whole team to constantly keep it up to date and break it off so it stays secure,” he continued. Given the already immense juggling act as devs balance single-player, multiplayer, Warzone, DMZ, co-op, and everything else in between, adding another plate to the mix just hasn’t been feasible for the team. But that’s not to say it’s completely out of the question. “It’s something we would love to do,” Cecot, Infinity Ward’s Design Director of Multiplayer, chimed in. “It’s just the complexity of our game and the creation of our game, the fact it’s photorealistic, it’s not something we’ve been able to do. “So we don’t have any info on that, but like Geoff said, we both used mod tools and got hired for using mod tools, so it is really cool to see other spots in the industry putting those things in.” So clearly, while the idea of a map editor in CoD is seemingly out of the question for now, it’s not something the dev team is directly opposed to. Rather, quite the opposite. Perhaps further down the line, as priorities change and community demand fluctuates, the conversation could bubble up again. But for now, a CoD map editor isn’t a top priority given the workload surrounding other existing elements in play.

Call of Duty devs eager to copy Overwatch 2’s recent fan-made map event ActivisionInfinity Ward’s lead multiplayer developers would be down to copy Overwatch 2’s recent fan-made map-creation event, letting Call of Duty players in on the experience of designing a new battleground from scratch. At the tail end of 2022, the Overwatch 2 dev team did something brand new on Twitch. For the first time, fans were able to peek under the hood and help design a multiplayer map from scratch. From placing key geometry to adding special quirks around the environment, players had their say in how it all came together. Originally, it seemed this one-off Twitch stream was purely an experiment, some lighthearted fun in the holiday season. However, four months later, after some polishing up from Blizzard, and this community-built map actually made its way into the game. Overwatch 2 briefly featured a fan creation for all to enjoy in the more casual-oriented Arcade space. In speaking with two lead multiplayer devs on the Call of Duty team, another mega-popular FPS franchise under the Activision Blizzard umbrella, we learned they’d very much be eager to do the same for their own title. “I think that would be awesome,” Infinity Ward’s Multiplayer Design Director Geoff Smith replied as we pitched the idea in a recent interview. Clearly not opposed to letting fans in on the process and getting a little chaotic, he was instead enthusiastic about the idea, though with a slight catch. For a community-designed map in the CoD series, they would have to start with a smaller play space, Smith explained. “I think Battlefield did that, but those are much larger maps and I think that process took them six, eight months, maybe a year. So you get a lot of buy-in early on, then people kind of peter out. “But I think that would be a super cool event to do. Maybe try to do a smaller map so it can turn around quicker.” Obviously, nothing is set in stone, but Infinity Ward would certainly be up for it. Co-Design Director of Multiplayer Joseph Cecot even joked this smaller fan build could end up being “Shipment 2.” We’ll just have to wait and see if an event of this kind ever comes to fruition on the CoD side. But given the success of the Overwatch 2 Twitch stream, and the map’s later arrival in-game, it would no doubt be fascinating to see what the CoD community would make.

Call of Duty devs confirm they’re working on Modern Warfare 2019 fixes ActivisionCall of Duty’s developers have finally answered a question plaguing a devoted number of players. After weeks of complaints, the devs have confirmed that fixes are currently in the works for Modern Warfare 2019. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2019 is one of the most divisive CoD titles in history. As social media will tell you, competitive players loathed the game (which lacked any ranked play and few beloved maps), while casuals adored it. An obvious stepping point in the franchise, Infinity Ward’s MW19 engine brought about a new era of movement and immersion, while serving as the foundation for Warzone and 2022’s Vanguard as well. While the game still has a number of players, even two years later, bugs and crashes have prevented devoted fans from playing it since December. Now, CoD is finally responding and confirming that fixes are coming. Modern Warfare 2019 fans slam devs for ‘unplayable’ game Are you guys aware console players still can’t play a single game of Modern Warfare without crashing for past 3 weeks since the Warzone updates? They deserve to be addressed with a plan of action bare minimum. @Activision @ATVIAssist @InfinityWard @RavenSoftware @SHGames — Devour (@Devour808) January 4, 2022 As a number of tweets explain, including the above, MW19 has been impossible to play for many people recently. Twitter’s ‘DevourMas’ said the issues arose with Warzone’s Pacific update on December 8, which fits the weeks-long timeline given by other accounts. Despite complaints ranging back into December, the devs had not responded to the concerns until now. On January 13, CoD’s official account posted an update explaining that a number of bugs – across Warzone, Vanguard, and MW19 – are in the works. CoD devs promise fixes for Modern Warfare https://twitter.com/CallofDuty/status/1481689396885790726 In the new message, the CoD team explained that they “are hard at work addressing the issues that are being across Vanguard, Warzone, and Modern Warfare.” Additionally, they wanted players to know that “updates are being deployed as quickly as possible.” This information is likely most appreciated by MW19 fans, who have experienced radio silence while the later games have had a number of updates over the past few weeks. As far as timelines for the upcoming fixes to the still-populated 2019 title, there were no clear indications. CoD’s tweet did mention following the game’s developer, Infinity Ward, though – so it’s likely that further updates will be posted by them.

Call of Duty devs are “down” for a permanent fixture of maps to remain year over year ActivisionCould the Call of Duty series ever feature a permanent set of multiplayer maps that carry over from one annual release to the next? While nothing is set in stone, Infinity Ward’s Multiplayer Design Director Geoff Smith was certainly keen on the idea in our exclusive interview. Death, taxes, and a new Call of Duty game every year are the only three certainties in life. Well, while details around 2023’s potential release remain murky, that’s at least been the case with Activision’s best-selling CoD franchise for the better part of 20 years now. With each new iteration typically comes a new setting, new features, and of course, a new batch of multiplayer maps as dev teams rotate through the series. From Infinity Ward to Treyarch and Raven, each major studio has its own way of handling things and thus, every 12 month-period is effectively a fresh start on the cycle. However, that isn’t the case elsewhere in the realm of CoD. In CoD Mobile, for instance, it’s one continuously evolving game that simply gets updated with new seasonal content on a monthly basis. Yet while new maps are flying through thick and fast, an existing lineup of CoD’s most iconic locations remains intact, always there for fans to enjoy. It’s this idea at Dexerto been in favor of for mainline CoD to mirror for a number of years now, and we finally got the chance to pitch it directly to those in charge. In speaking with Infinity Ward’s Geoff Smith, he agreed it was a nifty idea and one the team would “be down” to copy. “It hasn’t [been discussed] but I think it’s a good point,” Smith said on the idea of having a selection of iconic CoD maps sticking around year in and year out. On the plus side, he supported the notion to help with competitive integrity. Having the same set of maps playable every year without fail, rather than wiping the slate clean, could go a long way in keeping things balanced at the highest level of play in particular. “I think for strategy and play, that makes a lot of sense,” he continued. “We would be down. It’s more just about picking that roster.” One concern, however, would be its sustainability in the long run. Smith questioned whether fans would still be excited to tune in and watch competitions featuring the same maps a full decade down the road. “I would wonder if Dust II for 10 years is still watchable. That’s the big thing. It’s competition, but it’s also entertainment.” Ultimately, the decision to test such an idea in the mainline CoD series is out of the developer’s hands for the time being. “That’s down to the business side of how they want to run that.” Would it be logical on the financial side for Activision to carry select Call of Duty maps across from year to year without charging for them again? Most likely not. But would it be a huge benefit to the community and in particular, the competitive crowd? Unquestionably. So while nothing is set in stone for now, it’s seemingly something Infinity Ward would support should the idea gain traction internally.

Call of Duty devs announce new measures to deal with in-game racism Infinity WardInfinity Ward, developers of Warzone and Modern Warfare, have revealed a host of new measures to combat in-game racism, after fans demanded they took action. Recent events in the USA have sparked a renewed focus on racial inequality, including in the video game community. Sony postponed the reveal of their upcoming Playstation 5, while Epic Games announced another delay to the launch of Fortnite’s third season, to allow more important voices to be heard. Call of Duty, for its part, has announced a delay to Modern Warfare and Warzone’s fourth season, and postponed the CDL Minnesota event by one week. They also confirmed that more news about “how the Call of Duty League family plans to pay tribute to George Floyd and dedicate this Home Series to supporting the fight for social justice” will follow. On June 3, a statement from CoD developers Infinity Ward revealed further in-game measures to combat prejudice and racism. Modern Warfare’s move towards name customization – as opposed to using PSN/Xbox Live usernames – has allowed some users to use racial slurs in their gamertags. “There is no place for racist content in our game,” the statement reads. “This is an effort we began with launch and we need to do a better job. We’re issuing thousands of daily bans of racist and hate-oriented names.” The announcement details a host of in-game adjustments made to combat hateful names and slurs. These include additional resources to monitor hateful gamertags, and making it easier for players to report individuals responsible. It also states that there will be greater restrictions on usernames, as well as an increase in the number of permanent bans to stop repeat offenders from being able to continue their behavior. The response was partly pushed by a trending hashtag, #EndCODRacism, which argued that it had been a problem in Call of Duty for too long. Of course hate can also occur in voice chat and messages, as well as usernames/gamertags.

Call of Duty devs already have series planned out through 2027 ActivisionActivision president Rob Kostich revealed that an active team of 3,000 devs has Call of Duty games planned out through 2027. Fans originally had no idea what to expect from Call of Duty in 2023. Rumors ranged from Modern Warfare 2 having a two-year life cycle to a paid expansion with classic maps to celebrate the franchise’s 20th anniversary. In the end, Activision announced a “full annual premium release,” which ended up becoming Modern Warfare 3. Sledgehammer Games’ latest title hits shelves in just a few weeks, but it’s never too early to start looking ahead. And fans are already getting excited about what could possibly be in store, as a leak suggested that CoD 2025 will remaster Black Ops 2 maps, similar to how MW3 restored classic MW2 (2009) environments. Rumors also indicate COD 2024 will have fan-favorite studio Treyarch at the helm. With much of the franchise’s future shrouded in mystery, Activision president Rob Kostich gave fans a peak behind the curtain. Call of Duty games confirmed through 2027 If there was ever any doubt about Call of Duty’s future, Activision president Rob Kostich put any of that talk to rest in an interview with Venture Beat. “Right now, we have games planned out all the way through ’27 for the things that we’re working on,” Kostich confirmed. Activision’s president also revealed that the company has 3,000 developers actively working on the series. As for what fans can expect from upcoming titles, Kostich claimed: “I think we’ve done a lot of games in the future. We probably went as far there as we possibly could. We made some of the games in the past. You start to see the sweet spot over time and what really resonates with the community.” Fans won’t have to wait much longer to get their hands on the newest series entry, with Modern Warfare 3 releasing worldwide on November 10.

Call of Duty developers Infinity Ward hint at open-world RPG in new job listing ActivisionCould the Call of Duty franchise be pivoting to an open-world structure in the near future? It may very well be in the cards as a new Infinity Ward job listing has revealed a potential CoD role-playing game (RPG) in the works. Since the very first CoD title in 2003, the franchise has remained true to its linear FPS foundations. All 18 mainline entries in the series have delivered on the same traditional campaign structure that pushes you from one chapter to the next. However, that trend could soon be changing as Activision eyes a more ambitious future for its $30 billion franchise. For the first time since doors opened on Infinity Ward’s Polish studio in 2017, the team in Krakow appears to be gearing up for a game of its own, rather than assisting the global team in a strictly R&D-based capacity. This new undertaking could mark an entirely new step for the CoD franchise as the Infinity Ward crew is now seeking a Narrative Director to craft an open-world RPG. Through a job listing still visible on the Infinity Ward careers page, the studio may have revealed what’s next for CoD. With an emphasis on “narrative and cinematic experience in an open-world RPG,” the project seems to be targeting every familiar beat of the genre. “Story, characters, lore, and world-building” are all highlighted, as are new “writers [and] quest designers” while the Polish studio looks to expand for this big-budget project. The “ideal candidate” for the role must have ample experience creating “non-linear narratives in open-world games,” the job listing reads. While there’s no telling for certain this “unannounced AAA project” pertains to the CoD series, it’s worth bearing in mind that Infinity Ward has never published a game outside of the IP. Exactly what an open-world CoD RPG looks like, is something we’ll have to wait and see, if it indeed pans out as a new entry in the franchise. From unique leveling systems to looter-shooter features, anything is possible for the new game. Though it’s just one of many ambitious projects in the works under Activision’s umbrella at this point in time. Read More: Modern Warfare 2: Everything we know – From a Warzone follow-up to a standalone Zombies game and even multiple mobile titles, there’s plenty on the horizon for the CoD community.

Call of Duty developer confirms franchise always had SBMM but it’s getting “better” ActivisionSkill-based matchmaking (SBMM) has been a controversial subject in recent years but veteran multiplayer developer Josh Menke recently confirmed the feature has always existed in the Call of Duty franchise and assured that it’s getting “better” with each generation. When you search for a multiplayer game in any online title, you’re entered into a matchmaking pool. This system is responsible for getting you into a lobby with certain teammates and enemies. When multiplayer titles first started gaining popularity, the process was much simpler. “You just logged into a game and you tried to find a server to join on your own,” Menke, a multiplayer designer with experience on both Halo and CoD explained. It was a manual system where players had to “scroll through a list to try and find a game that looked good.” In the years that followed, “[developers] started to automate that,” Menke said. As a result of this automation, SBMM has become an extremely contentious talking point. But although this controversy has only exploded in recent years, the feature has been in effect from the very beginning, he claimed. At its core, SBMM aims to get you in lobbies with players of similar skill. A number of different factors are weighed up on the fly as everything from hours played to total wins may be taken into consideration. The end goal being competitive games, rather than lopsided stomps. While many complain about SBMM in its current form, it’s always been in effect, according to Menke. “[Modern Warfare 2007] did have some skill-based matchmaking,” he confirmed. “All of them always have, it’s just the math and science has gotten better over the years and caught up. If you grew up on it back then, your expectations are very different than if you have it now. “You’ll have players who play Call of Duty, that will be like, I don’t like skill-based matchmaking, but then they go play Valorant and it’s fine.” While various publishers may have emphasized different elements of SBMM in their titles, Menke argues “the way it should be done” is by “gathering real-time stats.” Whichever side of the argument you fall on, it’s clear SBMM has been around for the long run and isn’t going anywhere soon.

Call of Duty dev reveals how bullet drop will work in Modern Warfare Call of DutyInfinity Ward art director Joel Emslie discussed key changes to game mechanics in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare at E3 on June 11, namely their new approach to weapon ballistics. The original Modern Warfare trilogy is among the most iconic game franchises in history, which puts a lot of pressure on Infinity Ward to get the next game right – but that doesn’t mean they’re not taking any risks. Emslie, who previously worked on the first two Modern Warfare games before leaving to join Respawn Entertainment, explained how gunplay mechanics have changed now he’s back working on the franchise. 2019’s Call of Duty will be a “reimagining” of the Modern Warfare franchise. Past CoD games have all used a system called ‘hit-scan’ for bullet registration. Put simply, this means that the moment the weapon is fired, the bullet lands on its target instantly, with no ‘travel-time’ whatsoever. This is crucial, particularly for multiplayer modes, where more realistic weapon and caliber characteristics are not conducive to competitive gameplay, where balance and consistency is king. However, at least for campaign, the new game will incorporate bullet trajectory into the gameplay. Emslie reveals: “If you’re firing a DMR or sniper rifle, you have to really take into account bullet drop, and in one case, maybe a little bit of windage.” This isn’t the first time bullet drop has been incorporated into Call of Duty though; it is prominent in Blackout, Black Ops 4’s battle royale mode, and played a major role in one legendary mission from the original Modern Warfare. In the classic ‘All Ghillied Up’, which is regarded as one of the finest FPS missions ever made, a young Captain Price is instructed to account for bullet drop and wind speed/direction, before taking (and missing) the crucial shot at Imran Zakhaev, the game’s chief antagonist. CoD 4 had the first use of bullet drop and wind (and even the curvature of the earth) when lining up a shot. Emslie’s explanation may give some fans of the series cause for concern, worried that it could be transposed to the multiplayer portion of the game. The developers have made it abundantly clear that what applies in one mode, will apply in all. Narrative director Taylor Kurosaki explained: “Whether you’re playing in co-op or multiplayer or single-player, you’re playing in the same world, the rules are all the same.” Whether this means that bullet drop, penetration, and even windage will also be considerations in multiplayer is unknown, but if so, players may be in for a bigger surprise than expected come October 25 when the game releases.

Call of Duty dev calls out Activision following apology for Warzone & Vanguard issues ActivisionA Call of Duty dev working for Activision has hit out at their own company following the publisher’s apology for the current state of CoD titles. On a number of fronts, Call of Duty and Activision are coming in for serious criticism. The company itself is embroiled in legal controversy following allegations of harassment and discrimination in the workplace that surfaced in the summer of 2021. In term of Call of Duty, many players are frustrated with prevalent bugs and glitches in Warzone, Vanguard, and even 2019’s Modern Warfare. The widespread problems led to a formal apology from Activision, who said: “Our teams are hard at work addressing the issues… Updates are being deployed as quickly as possible.” https://twitter.com/CallofDuty/status/1481689396885790726?s=20 While many were pleased at the step forward in terms of communication and clarity, many also noted a response from a CoD developer working in Quality Assurance at Activision. QA roles relate to finding bugs and glitches in video games, but they too have been involved in controversy at Activision. Reports in December suggested some QA staff were fired after receiving promises of better pay. Kate Anderson responded sceptically to the apology on the main CoD Twitter account, saying: “Striking employees have received countless similar emails also saying “we hear you, and we feel your frustrations” yet leadership refuses to communicate directly with us.” Striking employees have received countless similar emails also saying “”we hear you, and we feel your frustrations”” yet leadership refuses to communicate directly with us. The state of COD games right now is a direct result of their inability to lead responsibly. https://t.co/loHJHjjgza — Kate Anderson 🇵🇸 FREE PALESTINE 🇵🇸 (@RebelComicNerd) January 15, 2022 They summarized: “The state of COD games right now is a direct result of their inability to lead responsibly.” Many picked up on Anderson’s response and echoed their suggestions that Activision’s internal issues are likely contributing to the poor state of their products. There are even reports stating that CoD 2022 – thought to be a sequel to 2019’s Modern Warfare – will release earlier than normal to combat the poor sales and reception of Vanguard. Only time will tell if the state of the games gets turned around.

Call of Duty: Denial Esports hint at signing a top squad from CWL Vegas North American esports organization Denial Esports are seemingly on the verge of signing a Call of Duty team and it may be one of the stronger squads that the NA region has to offer. Denial have been all but nonexistent in the CoD competitive scene since Advanced Warfare, after winning the prestigious Call of Duty Championship and placing second at the MLG World Finals in 2015. However, the org has made it clear that they’re prepared to recruit and field a team this Black Ops 4 season, made further evident by these tweets they put out on December 23 and 24. While nothing has been officially announced, or even leaked, there are signs that point to Denial possibly looking into signing the team that represented Str8 Rippin at the recent $250,000 CWL Vegas tournament, the first major event of the Black Ops 4 season. That roster currently features Michael ‘SpaceLy’ Schmale, Michaek ‘MajorManiak’ Szymaniak, Jared ‘Nagafen’ Harrell, Colt ‘Havok’ McLendon, and Chance ‘Maux’ Moncivaez. The team performed very well at CWL Vegas, qualifying for Pool Play via the qualifier tournament, going 3-1 in pool C to finish second and ahead of powerhouse teams FaZe Clan and Envy, and making a strong run in the Championship Bracket to finish 7th-8th overall and securing a spot in the CWL Pro League qualifier tournament. After CWL Vegas, despite their strong performance, the roster and Str8 Ripping mutually parted ways, which was part of their original agreement that they would be representing the org for the first event only. Considering that they are the only free agent North American team to have finished in the top-24, it would certainly make sense for Denial to make a strong push to bring them onboard, especially since they are in the market to sign a team. SpaceLy and co. have also made it clear that they want to sign with a serious org on a permanent basis for the remainder of the season, which Denial and their championship pedigree could provide. Perhaps the biggest and most telltale sign that this partnership is bound to happen is the fact that Denial publicly purchased a rather expensive jacket for SpaceLy as a Christmas gift. SpaceLy had tweeted out about a Moncler Maya jacket on December 19, to which Denial’s official Twitter page responded with a simple “Merry Christmas” message. On December 24, SpaceLy tweeted out again that the org had indeed gone through with the $1,175 purchase and sent him the jacket. Lmaoo yeooo fam… they deadass just bought me this jacket :sob::fire: — SpaceLy – Mike (@SpaceLy) December 24, 2018 While this is not definitive proof of any sort or by any means, it would certainly seem strange for Denial to spend over a 1000 dollars on a piece of clothing for a free agent CoD player who doesn’t have much to do with them. With all of these developments coming to light, it’s worth keeping an eye out for any more hints or signs, or even a potential announcement coming in the near future.

Call of Duty: CWL announces update regarding the new Zero Specialist in competitive play The Call of Duty World League has announced what it plan to do with the brand new Zero Specialist when it comes to competitive play in Black Ops 4. Released as part of the launch of the Operation Absolute Zero in-game event on December 11, Zero became the first new Specialist to be added since Black Ops 4 first launched on October 12. This has created a dilemma of sorts for competitive players because they are in the dark when it comes to how Zero will fit in to competitive play and the official CWL rule-set. According to an official tweet put out by the CWL late on December 21, Zero will not be featured in competitive play at this time as the official rule-set will remain the same from what it was at the recent $250,000 CWL Vegas event. This means that all of the players from the 28 teams that will be competing in the qualifier tournament for the CWL Pro League will not have to worry about changing their strategies and game plans to include Zero. Call of Duty World League will keep the ruleset consistent between CWL Las Vegas and the Pro League Qualifier. We will examine bringing Zero into the rules closer to the start of the Pro League in February. — Call of Duty World League (@CODWorldLeague) December 22, 2018 However, as the tweet above indicates, this is not going to the permanent status of the new Specialist, as the CWL plans on “examining bringing Zero into the rules” by the time the Pro League kicks off on February 4. Until then, players will want to avoid using Zero in any practices or scrimmage against other teams as they prepare for the qualifier tournament. How Zero will eventually fit into competitive, or whether it will even be added, remains to be seen, although whatever that gets decided is likely to have its fair share of supporters and naysayers. The topic has already created a split opinion when it comes to the community, with the likes of OpTic’s Scump announcing his disapproval of Zero’s abilities while Envy captain ACHES not happy with how other pro players are bashing the Specialist. Zero includes two main features – Disruptor and Icepick – the first acting as an EMP that disables enemy HUDs and equipment and the latter having that ability to hack enemy scorestreaks.

Call of Duty could release on PlayStation Plus thanks to Microsoft deal SonyA court document revealed that Call of Duty could come to PlayStation Plus, yet it’s no guarantee. Xbox CEO Phil Spencer delivered a crushing blow to Call of Duty fans by announcing: “It will take us time to get the (COD) games on Game Pass.” Xbox players previously held out hope that the series would come immediately to Game Pass if Microsoft completed its nearly $70 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard. And Game Pass isn’t the only subscription service we expect to see COD on. Ubisoft and Activision Blizzard teamed up for a 15-year deal to bring COD, Overwatch, Diablo, and other titles to Ubisoft+. So, where does PlayStation fit into all of this? In July, Microsoft reached an agreement with PlayStation that ensures Call of Duty will remain on both consoles in the future despite a possible extension. Both companies have kept tight-lipped about the deal’s exact details, but court documents painted a clearer picture. Will Call of Duty be on PlayStation Plus? In the spirit of age-old console wars, Microsoft and Sony haven’t exactly always seen eye-to-eye about the pending Activision merger. In February, reports indicated that Sony cut off communication with Microsoft in regards to discussing the potential merger despite both companies previously discussing the deal openly. Of course, we know the two sides eventually reached a resolution, but CharlieIntel reported an ironic twist to the tale. “The Microsoft x Sony 10-year deal for Call of Duty that was signed in July – is the same deal Microsoft offered Sony back in December.” The Call of Duty insider also reported: “In a court filing, Microsoft says it would grant Sony the right to put Call of Duty on PlayStation Plus.” It’s unclear if the court filing guarantees COD on PlayStation Plus, but this is nonetheless exciting news for fans jealous of the series coming to Xbox Game Pass. Everything depends on Microsoft completing its acquisition of Activision Blizzard.

Call of Duty confirms classic minimap finally returns in Modern Warfare 3 ActivisionCall of Duty has confirmed that a major, highly-requested feature will be returning to the title for Modern Warfare 3, leaving players delighted almost unanimously across the board. In recent years, many COD players have grown frustrated with the franchise, as major changes made to the game, as well as certain features, have come under serious disrepute. The loss of Ninja or Dead Silence as a perk, and instead becoming a field upgrade, has become a major point of contention, as well as other features such as an ever-fastening TTK. Perhaps the most divisive of all, however, is the changes made to the minimap, a staple of Call of Duty for well over a decade. In Modern Warfare (2019), Infinity Ward removed red dots for unsuppressed fire from the minimap in the beta, albeit there were only red dots on the overhead compass in the main game after mass backlash. In Modern Warfare 2 (2022), this change persisted, despite a barrage of complaints from players, who didn’t agree with Infinity Ward’s creative vision for the game. Modern Warfare 3: Return of the classic minimap Now, in the third (and what many presume to be final) game in the newly-rebooted Modern Warfare trilogy, developers Sledgehammer Games appear to have listened to the community and given them what they want. On Monday, August 14, CharlieIntel tweeted the following, alongside a screenshot of a text conversation with the number that appeared in the MW3 reveal trailer: “Classic mini map confirmed for MW3.” This has been largely celebrated by pretty much every corner of the Call of Duty community, with both casual and competitive fans alike rejoicing. While there have of course been some players who liked the lack of red dots, they’re a seriously small minority, and players have a lot more reason to look forward to the game now. This is especially true after some of the other leaks that occurred on August 14, as it was reported that all Modern Warfare 2 (2009) maps will be remastered for the game, as well as huge changes to TTK and tac sprint.

Call of Duty confirm R9-0 & Kilo nerfs, BOCW weapon buffs in Warzone ActivisionAnswering the Call of Duty: Warzone community’s prayers, the meta appears to be shifting in Black Ops Cold War Season 1. Raven Software have briefly revealed nerfs to the Dragon’s Breath R9-0 and Kilo 141, alongside buffs to the BOCW gun ranges. For what feels like an eternity to fans, the Dragon’s Breath R9-0 shotgun’s “Doof Doof” has terrorized indoor quarters while the Kilo’s lethality at range has dominated the outdoors. Now, that appears to be changing dramatically as Black Ops Cold War integrates with the Modern Warfare weaponry. Fans of CoD’s popular battle royale were devastated to see zero adjustments to Modern Warfare’s strongest guns in the Season 1 patch notes. Although BOCW’s assault rifles and submachine guns are fun, few considered them potent enough to supplant the current meta. Now, Raven Software’s Creative Director Amos Hodge briefly clarified that the game’s most abused guns have, in fact, been nerfed. And, contrastingly, he confirmed that the BOCW Agency Suppressor attachment has been buffed to match MW’s Monolithic Suppressor. But his tweets have now been deleted, lending uncertainty to the situation until official patch notes arrive. The R9-0 nerf is probably the most demanded change to the game’s weapons since Warzone debuted in March 2020. While developers tried to get the integration for BOCW Season 1 sorted, the meta was left as a flurry of “Doof Doofs” across the map. It was the Origin-12 and then the R9-0 meta, and players quickly grew tired of the shotgun supremacy on Verdansk. Read more: NICKMERCS reveals “best” MAC-10 – Further, the Kilo 141 quickly emerged as the best gun in the game following the meta’s transition from Grau to MK9 Bruen. An excellent option with a medium- to long-range optic, the Kilo’s damage at range made it a necessity in Warzone. Hodge confirms that should be changing. In another since-deleted tweet, Hodge claimed that the “WZ specific range buff on the Kilio 141 was reduced” and that BOCW’s “agency suppressor was brought in line with the monolithic suppressor.” If true and the Kilo’s range buff in Warzone is nerfed, then it suddenly becomes much more similar to other assault rifles and is in line with the Grau — which suffered a drastic downturn in usage due to damage concerns after its range nerf. The gun will still be great for recoil control, but not quite as dangerous. The reason that none of the Cold War guns felt comparable to any of Warzone’s earlier offerings is because no muzzle could match the Monolithic Suppressor’s potency. Now, with the Kilo nerfed and the Agency Suppressor providing perks to range (and possibly some recoil control), BOCW’s assault rifles should be legitimate options on Verdansk. At the moment, it’s unclear which AR will replace the Kilo. It’s not even clear what’s going on with these buffs and nerfs since they weren’t mentioned in official patch notes and have since been deleted. But one can reasonably expect the MAC-10 SMG to erupt in usage as a secondary while players continue to try out BOCW guns like the Stoner LMG and Krig AR as primary weapons in Warzone.

Call of Duty Companion App officially announced ActivisionActivision have officially unveiled the brand new Call of Duty Companion App for iOS and Android mobile devices. Officially announced on November 1, the app is now available for free download from either the App Store or Google Play store. The Companion App has three main functions – players can use it to connect with one another, receive personalized recaps and tips based on their weekly in-game performances, and stay updated on everything that is going on in the world of Call of Duty. Stay Connected With Friends One of the main functions of the CoD Companion App is that players can track friends’ progress, accomplishments, battle stats and more. In addition, players can form squads with up to 20 others and in-game and exclusive rewards by completing certain objectives, including weekly challenges across all various Multiplayer games modes and Zombies. Personalized Match Reports and Analysis of Gameplay Through the Companion App, players will receive personalized and in-depth recaps of the matches they’ve played in Black Ops 4 Blackout, Multiplayer, and Zombies, as well as CoD: WWII. These recaps will include weekly Action Reports, Briefings, and statistics of weapons, equipment, and load-outs, all based on how the player performed in his or her matches the previous week. Stats will include EKIA and W/L ratios over time, shots fired and accuracy %, total time played, and more. The app will even suggest and recommend changes to a player’s gameplay in order to improve their in-game statistics. Keep Updated The Companion App will serve as an excellent way for players to keep themselves in the know on everything that is going on in Call of Duty. The app will notify players of upcoming updates, in-game events, and other news and intel, allowing them to keep updated on the go. In addition to everything above, it appears that players who sign into the app also receive a 500 CoD Point bonus they can use in-game to purchase cosmetic items. Furthermore, Activision have announced that there are future updates to the Companion App in the works that will add more advanced features, such as the ability to edit load-outs and customize characters. Source – Activision

Call of Duty community in uproar over “horrible” Modern Warfare spawns Spawns are often a nightmare at the release of any given Call of Duty title, however Modern Warfare might be one of the most extreme examples to date. Released on October 25, the Call of Duty community has had just under a week to acclimate to Infinity Ward’s Modern Warfare and one of the most controversial talking points in the community centers around the current spawning system. With flawed map designs already getting on the nerves of professional players and game veterans, low-quality spawns might be the final straw for many Modern Warfare players. Partially through a game of Headquarters on Hackney Yard, this clip exemplified just how painful it can be to respawn in an objective-based Modern Warfare game-type. Having been eliminated, the player respawned just 20 meters out from the objective, perfectly in the sightlines of an enemy with an Assault Rifle ready to mow them down. Respawning a second time, the unlucky player appeared right in front of an enemy once again. No amount of strategizing or aiming prowess can counter shoddy respawns in Call of Duty. Ground War appears to be the focal point of many absurd spawning encounters. With 64 players on the enormous maps at any given time, that’s a lot of respawning players to account for and as it currently stands, players have been spawning in some unlikely spots. Take this example from Reddit user ‘UlteriorCovert’ for instance. Sneaking up on an unaware sniper, this player is within very close proximity of the enemy, yet further opposition is still able to spawn in on their prone teammate. Two quick executions later and the enemies must have been flustered by such a ridiculous spawn. Another particularly egregious example out of the Ground War mode, highlighted how players can continually spawn in the exact same spot, regardless of enemies in close proximity. Read more: 5 best Overkill classes in Modern Warfare – Maxing out his streaks, this player racked up five kills in a row without even having to change his position. Call of Duty pros have taken aim at various issues in the game already, but even Rainbow Six Siege talent have been firing shots at the latest release in the series. Renowned Siege commentator Parker ‘Interro’ Mackay expressed his disdain on Twitter. Echoing the sentiment of many in the community, he explained that with “bad hit-reg, terrible maps, awful spawns,” among other feedback, “Modern Warfare may be the least fun I’ve had with a new Call of Duty in years.” Garbage sound, bad hit-reg, terrible maps, awful spawns, absurd aim-punch… Modern Warfare may be the least fun I’ve had with a new Call of Duty in several years. — Parker Mackay (@InterroTalks) October 25, 2019 Despite the criticism heaped onto the current spawning system, Modern Warfare developers have engaged in discussions online and assured players that they’re looking to work out the kinds in the near future. Multiplayer Co-Design Director at Infinity Ward, Joe Cecot recently explained that the developers are “looking at” an assortment of hotly debated issues from “footstep audio” to “battle chatter in one life modes” and “spawns” as a whole. It’s amazing to have the game out. The feedback is overwhelming. Thank you! Some but not all of the things we’re looking at: – footstep audio – claymore interaction and feedback – player battle chatter in one life modes – spawns#ModernWarfare— Joe Cecot (@JoeCecot) October 29, 2019 Just how soon Modern Warfare’s spawning system will be tweaked remains to be seen, however Infinity Ward has been quick to implement changes across the board since release. Recently, Dead Silence was the source of much controversy in the community and in a rapid October 28 patch, the footstep-dampening Field Upgrade was swiftly adjusted.

CoD fans furious over year-long PS4 exclusive Modern Warfare mode Set to release on October 25, Call of Duty franchise, has got the community riled up after the announcement of an exclusive mode. Following a public beta that was met with much praise from pro players and streamers alike, Infinity Ward’s first addition to the Call of Duty series since Infinite Warfare, was seemingly on a smooth path to release. Through Sony’s ‘State of Play’ broadcast on September 24, it was subtly announced after a bombastic campaign trailer, that the popular Special Ops mode would be making a return to the franchise, but with an upsetting twist. Teased at the conclusion of the campaign trailer for Modern Warfare, developers Infinity Ward showed the very first footage for the returning Spec Ops mode. A fan favorite game type in the series, Spec Ops in series past has been a slew of single-player or cooperative missions and survival-based challenges. In the 2019 release of Modern Warfare, it was announced that the Spec Ops Survival mode will be a timed exclusive for the PlayStation 4 platform. On October 25th, when the world is threatened, you’ll have to get your hands dirty so the world stays clean. #ModernWarfare pic.twitter.com/zOHAN7mhQz — Call of Duty (@CallofDuty) September 24, 2019 Regular Spec Ops missions and challenges will still be accessible across Xbox One and PC at release, however the specific Survival mode will not be made widespread until a full year later on October 1 2020. With the series being known for annual releases, this exclusive window essentially means that the Spec Ops Survival mode will be locked for Xbox and PC gamers all the way through until the release of the next Call of Duty title. The Call of Duty community have voiced displeasure at the announcement, as with the inclusion of unprecedented cross-play throughout the beta, players were assuming that the days of exclusivity for the franchise were well in the past. Reacting angrily to the news in a specific thread, Reddit user ‘BxLee’ has even gone as far as to say that “I’m done with the franchise I think.” Similarly, Reddit user ‘J2theP30’ couldn’t believe the announcement, baffled in saying “wait it’s legit 1 full year exclusive…what.” Announced through the State of Play livestream, we also got our very first look at the upcoming single-player campaign which sees return of fan favourite character Captain Price. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare releases on PC, PS4, and Xbox One on October 25.

Call of Duty community furious as Scump & others not given creator codes Infinity Ward / Instagram, @scumpabner / Instagram, @nadeshot[jwplayer br5AuoVJ]A new “Support a Creator” code beta is being rolled out across Call of Duty: Modern Warfare and Warzone, but the game’s fans and biggest community members are reacting very strongly to the creators selected. Seth ‘Scump’ Abner and Matthew ‘Nadeshot’ Haag are Call of Duty icons and considered two of the game’s most prominent figures. Now, as the former plays for the Call of Duty League’s Chicago Huntsmen and the latter helms 100 Thieves, neither has been selected for Modern Warfare’s creator code beta. This has led to huge Call of Duty figures like Hector ‘H3CZ’ Rodriguez lambasting the beta’s selections. The fact that neither @scump or @Nadeshot or @Pamaj got codes is FUCKED UP. (I don’t use the f word ever on twitter, but just needed to say it) — OpTic HecZ (@H3CZ) August 28, 2020 In general, it appears that the community’s surprise and anger surrounds the fact that notable streamers were selected for the creator program instead of players who have been grinding the game long before the surge in popularity brought about by Warzone. Instead of rewarding longtime CoD content creators and players like Scump, Nadeshot, and FaZe Pamaj, a variety of streamers who are newer to the game, or dabbled in other titles, were chosen. Those creators include the likes of TimTheTatman, NICKMERCS, Vikkstar, Symfuhny, Swagg, and NuFo. While most of the community isn’t specifically mad at these creators for taking the opportunity given to them, that hasn’t prevented players like the Seattle Surge’s Sam ‘Octane’ Larew from pointing out some of the seemingly undeserved selections. Glad we got Mel a code I was worried for a second https://t.co/HWB1kTdSJZ — Sam “Octane” Larew (@OctaneSam) August 28, 2020 Again, it should be reiterated that the community’s ire is not directed at creators chosen, but instead at the marketing decision to partner with some of those creators instead of players who have been grinding Call of Duty titles for years upon years. While some have pointed out that it makes sense to partner with streamers who have creator code experience from Fortnite, such as TimTheTatman, NICKMERCS, and Symfuhny, the overwhelming consensus has maintained that longtime CoD players still should have been rewarded as well. The “Support a Creator” is still in beta, so it is very likely that more and more players are added to it soon, but that hasn’t stopped some of the game’s most loyal proponents from being amazed that they were not selected. Most notably, Scump and Pamaj were quick to express their surprise on Twitter. 10 years of COD and countless hours logged in Do I deserve a code or did I just torch half of my life — OpTic Pamaj (@Pamaj) August 28, 2020 As of yet, Activision has not clarified how creators were selected for the beta or what the beta’s timeline will look like before it is opened up to include more. Although it’s a nice opportunity to support the game’s content players, that hasn’t stopped the community from being disappointed in the seeming recency bias toward selections. It seems only right that Infinity Ward responds by adding a new Scump operator to the game, with crown, cape, and all.

Call of Duty community frustrated over Modern Warfare double XP tokens Dedicated Modern Warfare players are fired up over the surprising wastefulness of limited-time Double XP tokens in the latest Call of Duty title. Outside of dedicated Double XP weekends throughout Infinity Ward’s latest, the only way to rapidly increase your experience gains is through Double XP tokens that apply for a set amount of time. From 30 minutes of double weapon experience to 45 minutes of overall gains, these rare tokens begin to count down from the second they are activated. Players sinking time into Modern Warfare were already upset at the fact that these tokens would countdown while sitting in lobbies for instance. New discoveries have further aggravated the situation however and the Call of Duty community appears beyond frustrated. 45 minutes of doubled experience sounds all well and good on paper, however recent experiences from dedicated players have uncovered that this 45-minute window is not entirely beneficial. Throughout various posts on December 4, Reddit users underscored their frustrations and raised awareness of extraneous factors that can completely waste the limited dobule XP time. “And this is why Double XP tokens should only countdown while in a match,” Reddit user ‘JSnayy’ explained upon sharing an image of an error code wasting away the remaining time of his doubled experience. Similarly, it turns out that Double XP tokens also count down while the game is updating. An unfortunate discovery that hit Reddit user ‘just-here-for-gold’ happened upon after having utilized a rare one-hour token. A 2.34GB update to download and install Version 1.11 of Modern Warfare came at the expense of the most lucrative Doble XP token in the game for this extremely unlucky player. Pleading change from Infinity Ward, the Call of Duty community vocalized their concerns and outlined how there’s little to no logic behind the current functionality of Double XP tokens in Modern Warfare. “I never understood why it counted down in real-time,” Reddit user ‘crazydave33’ expressed. “It makes no sense because when you’re sitting in a lobby waiting for the games to load up…no one is earning any XP. So what’s the point to making it count down? With an hour XP token, you’re lucky if you even get 30 mins of gameplay time before that sh*t expires.” With the introduction of Season One on December 3, a new Battle Pass system was implemented for the first time in Call of Duty history meaning that there is more content to unlock through XP gains and challenges than ever before. As experience is so remarkably valuable and Double XP tokens leave a lot to be desired, here’s a rundown on how to level up quickly in Modern Warfare.

Call of Duty community enraged over “insane” ticket prices for CDL events The first year of a brand new franchise-based league kicks off in 2020 and Call of Duty fans could not be more upset over the current ticket prices for the first batch of major events. With the schedule for the first split of the regular-season having just been unveiled on November 16, the Call of Duty community now knows where the first 62 matches will be taking place. From Paris to Seattle, tickets have already been released for a few homestand events and the initial price points have been turning fans away in droves. Starting with the launch event in Minnesota on January 24-26, general admission tickets cost $75 for a reserved seat on a single day. Special VIP passes cap out at $550 but includes tickets to each day of competition throughout the year, as well as access to a wide array of exclusive add-on perks, such as team merchandise and venue tours. Additionally, standing passes can come in as cheap $25 but won’t secure you a specific seat. Meanwhile, on the cheaper side of things, a two-day pass for the Atlanta homestead can come in as low as $50 in total. Comparatively, a weekend at the Seattle event will cost $80 while a VIP weekend-pass will run you $200. Marking the first iteration of the home and away style structure for Call of Duty events, it appears this transition has frustrated a number of fans, who preferred the previous structure of showcasing a host of teams in one location. To the displeasure of the community, the steep prices have sparked debates online with certain fans claiming that if the prices don’t drop the initial events will see poor turnouts. “All this to watch five league matches and an [amateur] tournament,” Reddit user ‘Dizzycod9’ said in response to Seattle’s price announcement. “The $200 tickets include meet and greets that used to be free and also early door access to the area and access to new merch. It’s gonna be dead inside the building.” Reddit user ‘the_Midg’ added their own thoughts, dubbing the pricing “actually insane.” “Once you add in accommodation and sh*t it’s not worth it. I’ll just watch on stream,” they said. Also entering the first year of a home and away game structure, ticket prices for 2020 Overwatch League events were similarly unveiled in August. On the cheaper side, the Los Angeles Gladiators, Florida Mayhem, Dallas Fuel, and Atlanta Reign are all charging under $70 for general admission tickets. Additionally, VIP passes range from $240 to $354 for an entire weekend of festivities. These prices fall in line with initial Call of Duty event costs, even exceeding in terms of VIP access. Local fans aren’t happy, however, especially considering the prices cover just two best of five matches during a single day. Numerous professional players have already voiced their displeasure with the initial schedule, complaining about the excessive travel for an extremely brief period of competition. OpTic Gaming’s GM Eric ‘Muddawg’ Sanders expressed, the LA-based squad will “have to fly to Paris to play a singular regular season match vs Atlanta.” Read More: Crimsix reveals Scump fight after CoD Champs – With certain series potentially ending in swift 3-0’s, elite talent may barely even be on stage for an hour at these large-scale events. we have to fly to paris to play a singular regular season match vs Atlanta lmao — 100T Muddawg (@Muddawg) November 15, 2019 There’s no telling whether ticket prices will drop as each major event draws near. However, with both fans and pro players complaining early on, it’s safe to say that the initial structure has left a bad taste. You can view the full rundown on 2020 matchups with our guide to the first Call of Duty League split.

Call of Duty community pleads Activision to support Australia fire relief Having just released an Australian-centric bundle of cosmetic content in Modern Warfare, the Call of Duty community is requesting that all profits be donated to Australian fire relief efforts by Infinity Ward. While the gaming community has come together in a number of heartfelt ways in support of the recent bushfire crisis impacting Australia, dedicated Call of Duty players are pleading Activision to focus their efforts in kind. Similar to a recent suggestion that gained traction in the Overwatch landscape, Modern Warfare’s avid community is requesting that all profits from the latest Season One content drop be donated to fire relief efforts in Australia. Released in a January 8 title update, Infinity Ward introduced two new cosmetic content bundles to Modern Warfare’s in-game store. One collection titled ‘Wolfpack,’ features two unique weapon skins, an emblem, and a new calling card themed around wolves. Additionally, the second bundle, ‘Outback,’ is unsurprisingly Australia-centric. With a prominent notice on the home-screen, the bundle is promoted with a sniper standing amidst Aussie bushland. “Australia has more deadly species than anywhere else. The deadliest? Humans,” the accompanying text reads. A larger content pack collecting all manner of cosmetic items from operator skins to finishing moves, each of the new additions are entirely themed around the sunburnt country. Added into the game while Australian’s endure the worst bushfire season the nation has ever seen, CoD fans are requesting Activision donate all profits from these particular cosmetics directly to fire relief efforts across the continent. Garnering a great deal of attention online, popular content creators have even chimed in and suggested that the publisher hop on board and support the cause. Blake Cissel of Team Summertime and NRG emphasized “it would be insanely cool to see proceeds of this “Outback” bundle benefit the Australian fire/wildlife relief. ” While countless fans have gestured in support of the movement in their own posts, an Activision representative responded to Cissel’s Tweet shortly after. “I know this is for a good cause as well considering what’s happening and I’ll let the teams know on my end as well.” Hey there, feel free to leave your feedback here for any suggestions and such that you’d like the teams to look at: https://t.co/iDH8NKqGb7 I know this is for a good cause as well considering what’s happening and I’ll let the teams know on my end as well 🙂 ^AS — Activision Support (@ATVIAssist) January 8, 2020 With months of sweltering heat left throughout the Australian summer, and fires still spreading, there’s a great deal left for the nation to endure before the crisis is fully under control. In the meantime, every bit of support can certainly go a long way. If you’d like to help, you can donate through the Australian Red Cross or The Salvation Army. Alternatively, you can send support directly to the brave souls currently combating the fires with the NSW Rural Fire Service.

Call of Duty Cold War players surprised to find “c**k” in a truck Activision / pixabayIt’s not every day that a Call of Duty writer gets to drop a title like this, but this is one such day. Black Ops Cold War players have made a startling easter egg discovery: a c**k in the front seat of a map’s truck. The latest episode of “what did I just see on Reddit” is a good one. This time, Call of Duty players have made the connection between a 2020 Black Ops map and a 1999 Counter-Strike map, all tied together by a love for… cockpit jokes. And it can all be seen in one, potato-quality video, possibly of a player recording their TV with a phone. As posted by ‘spicemonkey’ on Reddit, the Cold War Cartel map has a truck and within that truck is a not-so-subtle easter egg. You have to look closely to see it, ideally with a large optic, but if you want to prove that size doesn’t matter — you can probably just walk up to the vehicle and peek inside yourself. As spicemonkey shows, there is a rooster sitting in the front of the Cartel’s truck. Or, as they so eloquently put it, there is a “c**k in the truck.” (Yes, the term is safe for work according to animal husbandry usage. No, we are still not allowed to write it out.) While the bird itself is a funny thing to notice in the game, there is more than meets the eye. As the Reddit community has pointed out, this is a classic “cockpit” joke and one that has appeared in earlier video games as well. A user by the name of ‘Mr_Alucardo’ noted that this easter egg may actually be a reference to 1999’s CS beta, where the Italy map also has a “c**k in the truck.” Whatever the origin story may be, people are getting a kick out of this new discovery (phew, almost forgot the “s” there), but do have a simple concern: is the rooster safe in there? Cartel, located in Nicaragua, is presumably a hot map — so there are reasonable worries that the truck’s passenger may be under stress. The game’s developers at Treyarch have yet to explain why the truck’s windows have not been lowered to provide better airflow for this new fan-favorite rooster. Hopefully they do so in the Season 5 update.

Call of Duty: Clever fan concept would see natural disasters hit the Blackout map A Call of Duty fan has come up with a way to make the series’ first Battle Royale mode even more exciting, by introducing disasters to spice up the game. Blackout was included as part of the release of Call of Duty: Black Ops 4, and is the game’s first foray into the popular world of battle royale, which has taken over the market during the last couple of years. 100 players jump out of helicopters and land on the Blackout map, made up of classic Call of Duty maps like Nuketown, Array and Firing Range. The last person or squad standing is declared the winner, having outlasted all opponents to secure the victory. While Blackout games are already stressful affairs, Reddit user s3ca_au has come up with an idea that could change the landscape of Blackout forever – figuratively and literally! S3ca_au suggests the introduction of disasters, that would add another element of difficulty to the game. One example of this would be the dam located at Hydro Dam bursting, causing the map to flood, forcing players to fight against opponents, the storm and the rising water level. Comments also suggested things like earthquakes which would cause the ground to shake, or even thunderstorms, as thunder can already be heard on the map while playing. Adding these elements would add even more chaos to the battle royale game mode, which has become an extremely popular addition to the Call of Duty franchise. Unfortunately for fans of this idea, neither Treyarch not Activision have announced any official plans to add these disasters to the game.

Call of Duty chief responds to Highrise map return rumors for Warzone 2 Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2’s official reveal trailer was released June 8 — and fans on social media screenshotted images that may have confirmed the return of a fan-favorite map. Summer Game Fest 2022 revealed Modern Warfare 2 Campaign gameplay footage, featuring John ‘Soap McTavish and Ghost from the original Modern Warfare 2 (2009) campaign. CoD fans ‘lost their minds’ over the impressive MW2 reveal trailer. Call of Duty Insider Tom Henderson tweeted “Infinity Ward has already teased the Warzone 2 map in the Modern Warfare trailer,” and fans took screenshots of what looks like Highrise from the original Modern Warfare 2. Call of Duty General Managers responds to Highrise rumor General Manager of Call of Duty, Johanna Faries, and Infinity Ward Cinematics Lead Jeff Negus spoke at Summer Game Fest 2022. During the presentation, Faries said: “We’re so excited for October 28. It’s such a big moment, not just for Modern Warfare 2 and everything Jeff and the team at Infinity Ward have built, but it really marks what we’re calling a transformational moment for the entire franchise,” stating it would be all on one shared engine moving forward. Was this Highrise in the trailer? 🧐 #ModernWarfare2 pic.twitter.com/GFpOrTYTuK — CharlieIntel (@charlieINTEL) June 8, 2022 As seen in the image above, it does appear that Highrise was included in the MW2 reveal trailer, but interestingly there is no crane that was a key landmark in the original map. After being asked about teasers in the trailer, she added: “Yeah we’re seeing that from the community, we love when the fans can pick up some things. There’s been some chatter about maybe seeing Highrise, and other elements. We will get into the details of Warzone 2.0 for sure.” Faries did not officially confirm the return of Highrise for Warzone 2, but it is interesting she made note of the rumor and mentioned Warzone 2 as well. Check out all of our Modern Warfare 2 coverage here.

Call of Duty cheaters reach new heights in DMZ by learning to fly ActivisionCheating has been a long-running issue in Call of Duty’s lifespan, but many feel it’s ramped up in Modern Warfare 2 and Warzone 2. Now, it seems even DMZ is being inundated with hackers, with some literally taking it to new heights. With so many different modes in Call of Duty at the moment, it’s understandable to see cheaters appearing occasionally. While it’s certainly frustrating to play against, many can’t help but be slightly amused, especially when these cheaters find a hilariously out-of-the-box method to get the upper hand on a player. Now, in the popular DMZ mode, those cheats are taken to new heights, with one even learning how to fly, destroying the poor player in a brutal yet undeniably laughable manner. Call of Duty cheaters are now flying in DMZ Posting onto Reddit, user cynicalgrape shared their experience with a hacker who seemed to be flying while taking down the player. “There’s witches in DMZ now” they joked, including a pretty funny clip of their interaction with this cheater. Naturally, the post quickly garnered plenty of comments, with some joking about the video and others using it as a space to rant about their experiences with cheaters in DMZ. The poster explained in the comments how odd this hack was, stating “We’ve seen some aim bot crap, but this was a little too much,” going on to note how it seems the player was quickly removed after such an obvious stunt: “His account disappeared pretty quickly.” While many commented on the state of the game and how this was allowed to pass long enough to kill a player, others just found the video to be hilarious, joking that the cheater “looked like the green goblin” going on to jest that there may be “a Spiderman collaboration this season. We already have the Rhino and Juggernaut.” Diving into more detail regarding how they managed to pull this off, one player asked whether he was “riding a recon drone or a bomb drone?! going on to exclaim how “that’s f**king brilliant!” It seems, although the cheating can be frustrating, with many players finding it extremely annoying, most can’t help but find the videos hilarious.

Call of Duty cheater caught after monitor cam exposes Vanguard hacks on stream ActivisionA Call of Duty: Vanguard hacker got caught in the stupidest way possible, exposing his own cheats on stream with a monitor cam. Hacking has become a serious problem in Call of Duty. It started with the rise of battle royale hit Warzone, and since then, despite the implementation of the RICOCHET anti-cheat system, hacking has continued to be a sore on one of the biggest gaming franchises in the world. While it may have started on Warzone, it’s become a major problem in regular multiplayer too, spanning back to Modern Warfare and even further. As such, we’ve seen a number of hackers get caught out and banned — but this cheater might have just exposed himself in the stupidest way possible. During a 2v2 tournament, Vanguard duo iLuhvly and Sasuke were suspicious of their opponent, Kenji — and their suspicions turned out to be very easily confirmed. Kenji, presumably attempting to clear his name and make sure hacking accusations weren’t sent his way, decided to use a monitor cam to showcase his legitimate gameplay. Rather naively though, Kenji left his wallhacks on for everyone to see, and the boxes are clearly visible crossing his screen — though it obviously didn’t help too much, losing the final gunfight in the clip. GG’s Kenji CAUGHT 4K BOXES ON HIS MONITOR CAM! thanks to @iLuhvly the hacker detective and @CallenDisplay! #HACKERDOWN #4K pic.twitter.com/GSfef7SShH — SK (@NoLmtSK) March 29, 2022 Kenji was promptly banned on Checkmate Gaming, the tournament platform they were playing on, and has since deleted his Twitch account. Obviously, nobody should be hacking in online games, but if you’re going to, you at least need to be smart enough to not expose yourself doing it during a livestream. It appears Kenji didn’t get that memo.

Call of Duty cheat providers shut down as Activision strikes again ActivisionActivision has managed to shut down two more major Call of Duty cheat providers as complaints of hackers, predominantly in battle royale title Warzone, continue to run rampant. In recent months, the complaints around hackers have started to ramp up once again, with some even claiming that the situation has got as bad as prime Verdansk, before Activision even made their Ricochet anti-cheat. In 2022, cheat provider Cynical Software shut down after the threat of legal action from Activision, and now two more have joined them two years later. On Thursday, July 25, it was revealed that two more providers had been shut down after being served legal notices: RagingNation and Stealthware. In a statement to users, RagingNation said: “Someone affiliated with our business has received a legal notice from Activision. We may not agree with the assertions made in these legal demands, but we are in no position to litigate with such a large company. “It brings us no pleasure to inform all of you that we will be closing our business starting today. Thank you all for supporting us through today! We love our community, and this was the last thing we wanted to have to do.” In May 2024, it was confirmed that the biggest Call of Duty cheat provider, EngineOwning, was hit with a $14.4m fine following an Activision lawsuit against them, with Activision entitled to seize full control of the “illicit enterprise,” including the company’s domain name. Nevertheless, players are still reporting coming up against cheaters in Warzone and Modern Warfare 3, so there is still work to be done, especially in the upper echelons of ranked modes where top streamers and pros come up against hackers on a daily basis.

Call of Duty champion Crimsix slams ‘snowflakes’ during leadership discussion Call of Duty LeagueIan ‘Crimsix” Porter has been one of the Call of Duty League’s most outspoken pros since the creation of the CDL. He has the most championships of any player in CoD history and has turned his attention to leadership debates as his team pushes toward CDL Champs. Representing the Dallas Empire, Crimsix has been one of the esports biggest names in its history. And one of the biggest personalities too, as Crim never shies away from controversial topics. Being a part of two of the strongest dynasties Call of Duty has ever seen, the 37-time champion knows a thing or two about winning and rallying a team together. A lot of different Call of Duty pros have been very outspoken on what it takes to be a good leader. Crimsix did not hold back from such a tweet, which was in response to his recent comments regarding the Huke drama. https://twitter.com/DREAL_JE/status/1417177763748929541 The “Snowflake Lifestyle” just isn’t going to cut it Crimsix didn’t hold back when being called “ignorant” for believing that his way of being a leader is the right way to do things. You realize how stupid and ironic this take is right? Snowflake lifestyle ain’t copping a W on my watch. Criticism is a two way street. There is not only different ways of giving it, but there are also different ways of perceiving it. — Empire C6 (@Crimsix) July 19, 2021 According to Crim the “Snowflake lifestyle,” as he puts it, will not result in championships. As the winningest CoD pro of all time, he seems to have a good grip on how to lead a team. Just last year he led one of the most inexperienced teams in the league to a World Championship. Crim believes that he should not have to adapt to another player’s personality and know how to give them criticism without hurting their feelings. He seems to believe that since everyone is a professional, they should be able to handle criticism. Crimsix had the support of many pros from the community, Chris ‘Parasite’ Duarte said, “Not many will ever get it.” While another former pro, MadCat said, “For real no snowflake s**t round here, you either got a back bone or find another hobby!” The context behind Crim’s comments “”Realistically, it was just a simple disagreement.”” Weeks removed from Huke’s controversial @DallasEmpire departure, Crim has now argued the situation had “”nothing to do with drugs.”” (📹 @TheFlank) pic.twitter.com/tSMOuKHWLZ — Dexerto Esports (@DexertoEsports) July 19, 2021 For Crimsix this isn’t the first time this year we’ve seen his name in a controversial topic. He has been the most outspoken player when it comes to the dropping of Cuyler ‘Huke’ Garland, which resulted in this new discussion. During his appearance on “The Flank,” Crim said his video regarding that whole situation is coming out later this week, it’s just “waiting for approval.” We’ll tackle that video when it releases, but for now — the CoD community can chew on this debate. Attitudes toward leadership and the grind have been discussed in depth this year, with divisions about how best to handle different personalities. Ultimately, the opinion of the league’s winningest pro adds an interesting wrinkle to the discussion.

Call of Duty challenger Battle Bit Remastered becomes the top selling game on Steam Battle BitBattle Bit Remastered, an online FPS game developed by a team of just three indie developers, became the number-one-selling game globally on Steam. Entering a loaded field of FPS titles usually proves to be unforgiving for smaller titles. Plenty of indie battle royale games came and went, and traditional multiplayer experiences such as Splitgate and Rogue Company fizzled out as well. However, that hasn’t stopped developers from creating new projects. Ubisoft is by no means a small team, but XDefiant is a new free-to-play FPS game coming later this summer. Competing with industry giants such as Call of Duty and Apex Legends is no easy task. Battle Bit Remastered hasn’t quite reached those peaks, but the unique FPS has shown plenty of promise in its first few weeks. Battle Bit Remastered takes FPS community by storm Warzone fans celebrated the battle royale expanding to 150 players. And Battlefield 2042 went from 32v32 matches to 64v64. Battle Bit Remastered goes one step further than both, supporting 254-player servers. That many players on one battlefield results in absolute chaos, serving as a massive draw for FPS community members to try the game out. According to Stream Charts, Battle Bit reached a peak player count of over 31,000 players, averaging 24,940. The Battle Bit development team responded to the remarkable achievement: “Thanks for making us the #1 Selling Game Globally on Steam; this is unbelievable.” Content creators have flocked to Battle Bit and walked away with strong first impressions. Modern Warzone claimed: “This game has taken over the internet and honestly looks like more fun than Battlefield or COD!” JackFrags and FaZe Jev also both uploaded Battle Bit Remastered videos and sang the game’s praises. It will be interesting to see how that impressive player count number changes as the title just launched on June 15, but it’s an encouraging sign for the low poly FPS.

Call of Duty: Blackout Players Have Discovered a Glitch That Allows You to Duplicate Items One of the first major glitches, or exploits, to be discovered in the Call of Duty: Blackout beta allows players to duplicate items when playing with a partner. The bug was initially shared by nehpets1999 on Reddit along with a short clip and the description “we both picked up armor at the same time and ended up duplicating it”. The video shows both players interacting with the armor on the ground. When the first player picks up the armor, another version of it immediately appears for the second player that was holding down their equip button: The two players go on to double check what had happened, both dropping the identical level three pieces of armor on the ground to confirm what had happened. It is currently uncertain whether this glitch is only an issue with this particular set of armor, or whether it is a more widespread issue that is affecting various different items. One Reddit user responded to nehpets1999’s post to say “I just has this same thing happen with my duo partner earlier”, while another pointed out that it needs to fixed as soon as possible and exclaimed “imagine duplicating 10 trauma kits and 50 cal”. Finding and eliminating bugs and exploits like this, which could potentially be used to gain an unfair advantage, are among the most important jobs that game developers face when releasing a new title. The advantage to this one being found so early in the Blackout beta is that you can almost guarantee that it will never find its way to the full release of the game in October.

Call of Duty: Blackout player wins incredible match using only a Bowie Knife There’s a big difference between thinking that you could win a game with just a Bowie Knife on Call of Duty’s Blackout mode and actually doing it. Well, somebody has pulled it off! Apotheosis_13, who uploaded a video of their accomplishment to YouTube just over a week ago, was the first to admit the victory was “lucky”. The gamer didn’t choose to hide in the shadows though, slicing his way through a football team’s worth of zombies in the beginning after landing at the Asylum. The player then stabbed two players right off the bat. With his bloody blade in-hand, Apotheosis swam over towards a nearby quad bike – a risky move to make so much sound with no firearm. He headed over to Construction Site with smoke pouring out of his vehicle. This is where the next player was encountered. He wrapped the quad around the roof of the building to dodge bullets and fell. With the player still trying to kill him, Apotheosis managed to run clear of fire and get the kill. Now in the zone, Apotheosis decided to hold his position, realizing that he was surrounded by enemies. Players were coming from Estates, Array, Firing Range and Train Station. His chances of winning the game were dwindling with every footstep. Finding Level 3 armor was a crucial moment for the gamer, and as he scoured houses for more supplies, he came across an enemy player and was able to dice him up for his fourth kill. Apotheosis then spotted a truck nearby, and went on the offensive, using his Grappling Hook to close the distance to his opponents before slicing them up as well. Later on, a guy came storming into his room and almost shot him down, but the execution of the melee attack was perfect. He stabbed one more on the roof soon after, scarpering swiftly with his equipment again. As the circle neared and he was shot at again, Apotheoisis used the Grappling Hook to leap outside of the circle with his knife and seal the victory in style. It was an incredible win. Do you think you could you pull it off?

Call of Duty: Insane Blackout glitch throws players across the map A new Call Of Duty: Black Ops 4 Blackout glitch enables players to fly through the sky, as long as they flip a cargo truck first. Since Black Ops 4 was released in October, there have been many glitches across both the Blackout and Multiplayer modes. However, Treyarch have been doing their best to fix them by updating the game every few days. Plenty of bugs and errors still remain but this one reaches new heights In a post on the Black Ops 4 subreddit, user krayzie1877 showed an example of flying across the Blackout map. First, krayzie stood in the back of the cargo truck with a Hellion Salvo rocket launcher equipped, before rollling down a large hill towards the Train Station area of the map. Before the player reached the bottom, the truck rolled a few metres and flipped on to its side. Krayzie1877 then climbed on top of the flipped vehicle and waited for a few seconds before being sent skywards, flying above the map. Then, by shooting the equipped rocket launcher, the player ended up outside of the combat zone, and under the Pipeline area at the very south of the map. Read More: Black Ops 4: Nov. 27 update adds Firing Range Night and Seaside Sunset maps, plus two new modes – Patch Notes – In the same Reddit thread, user Cjgrig01 shared their own clip, again in a pre-game lobby, of their truck soaring through the skies. In the same Reddit thread, user ‘Cjgrig01’ shared their own clip, again in a pre-game lobby, of their truck soaring through the skies. Flying through the air in a truck isn’t anything new – since Blackout launched, plenty of players have flown through the air from a flipped truck, landing either very far away from where they started or falling to their death outside the combat zone. However, we have never seen anyone using a rocket launch like this to soar across the map. Read More: How to unlock classic Black Ops Zombies characters in Blackout – Dempsey, Nikolai, Richtofen, and Takeo – It’s clear that Treyarch still have a number of issues to patch in their game’s next update, but we can’t help but feel like the loss of this particular bug will be a sad thing!

Call of Duty: Blackout continues to make major strides on Twitch The Call of Duty: Blackout beta has has garnered massive views on Twitch, with some of the platform’s top personalities streaming the title. The game peaked at over 500,000 views during streams by Ninja, Shroud, Dr DisRespect, and other major names. It even beat out August’s Call of Duty Championships, which peaked at over 324,000 viewers across Twitch. most viewed games on Twitch in September, with over 101,000 average viewers overall. It sits just beneath Fortnite, League of Legends, and Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, which takes the crown at over 133,000 average viewers. Blackout was the number one most-viewed title in the U.S. during the implementation of the game’s PC pre-order beta, knocking Fortnite down to sixth place with 82,000 views. While Blackout’s viewcount is impressive, it still doesn’t take the mantle of Fornite, which was recorded as having 696,749 concurrent viewers on Twitch as of June 12, 2018. However, that isn’t to say that Blackout won’t eclipse the title. Many Fortnite players – Ninja in particular – have stated that the game will receive massive support, and other Fortnite pros ahve been streaming Blackout, as well. The Battle Royale genre continues to grow, with Blackout being the latest addition to the category. The genre’s development has made major shifts in the streaming world: Fortnite eclipsed Playerunknown’s Battlegrounds in mid-January of 2018, and has continued to earn double PUBG’s numbers across Twitch. With Blackout’s recent popularity, that trend could continue – but it’s still too early to tell.

Call of Duty: Blackout player destroys solo vs squads console world record A PlayStation 4 player appears to have smashed the console world record for most kills by a solo player in a squads match on Call of Duty’s battle royale mode, Blackout. Blackout is Activision’s first foray into the battle royale genre with Call of Duty, and sees 100 players dropping into a map dotted with some of the most popular locations from previous CoD titles such as Nuketown, Array and Firing Range. Since its release, Blackout players have been battling to gain ultimate bragging rights as a world record holder for most kills in matches. One of these records seems to have been smashed again, as PS4 player Scottish Casper appears to have broken the previous record of 31, almost two months after the last record was set. Blackout is Call of Duty’s first foray into the battle royale genre. The incredibly skillful player uploaded a video to his YouTube channel directly from his PlayStation 4 that shows him dominating opponents on his way to the new world record for console players. Scottish Casper tore through a multitude of opposing teams on his way to an amazing victory, finishing with a mindblowing 34 kills at the end of the game.” You can watch Scottish Casper’s full 21 minute gameplay below. To win a Blackout solos match alone is incredibly difficult, but to do it against teams of four without getting dropped is an astonishing feat. Picking up 34 kills means Scottish Casper took down over a third of the lobby single-handedly, which is nothing short of jaw-dropping. If you know of any other Blackout world record, or believe that our current records are incorrect, please let us know by contracting @DexertoINTEL on Twitter.

Call Of Duty: Blackout video of five-year-old rescuing Dad goes viral @Clever_TricksA clip of a five-year-old girl rescuing her dad in Call of Duty Blackout has gone viral. The video, which was uploaded to Twitter on December 2 has been viewed over 5.8 million times, with 110,000 people retweeting it and over 355,000 liking the post. Following on from the success of the video, CleverTricks – as he is known on Twitter – has posted more clips of the pair playing the battle royale mode on YouTube. Had to buy my daughter a mic so you could hear how cute it is when she saves the day. pic.twitter.com/aH0vkw8Zoa — Clever Tricks :dagger_knife::dagger_knife::dagger_knife::dagger_knife: (@Clever_Tricks) December 2, 2018 In the video, the father and daughter duo were pressed for time and had to make it back towards the circle, they stumbled upon some players. The dad picked up a fairly simple kill at point-blank range before charging towards the building’s window, where he hopped outside and quickly realized there was somebody behind him. His young daughter had remarkably called out that there might be another player there and she was right. He tried his best to maneuver into a good shooting position, but was shot down and looked on the brink of elimination, before asking for her help, saying: “I’m down. Go get him. Go get him. Go get him!” Using the GKS, his daughter dispatched of the opponent with ease and kept her father in the game by quickly reviving him. He thanked her, saying: “Oh my goodness, I can’t believe you did that. That’s amazing! Those guys just got merked by a five-year-old”. Following the video’s surge in popularity, the dad revealed that he had to buy his daughter a microphone so that other people could also hear her the next time she saves the day. Winning a game of Quads together played a big part in the decision to get her a headset. “I can’t keep up with liking all of your wholesome comments but know I am grateful for having the opportunity to share this with you all. It warms the heartstrings.” While some Call of Duty fans thought it was cute, others couldn’t believe that he had let his five-year-old daughter play CoD. “”and I’m FINE!”” God damn not only is your daughter young but she’s also a badass — Nemesis (@noomesis) December 3, 2018 A 5 year old playing shooting games? :monocle: nah! Not in the house I was raised in — TR3 (@jameison95) December 3, 2018 He has a healthy relationship with his daughter and she seems to be seriously enjoying herself. Bonding time and having an actual connection with your children is the GOOD parenting so you can honestly keep moving and take your wrong opinion else where. pic.twitter.com/08OxFVOA7i — Dorian The Hedgehog (@TheBlackLuffy) December 2, 2018

Call of Duty Blackout beta has another new limited time mode now available With only three days remaining of the Blackout beta on PC, PS4 and Xbox, Treyarch has added yet another new mode into the playlist called Close Quarters Frenzy. This mode is pretty much a combination of the two previous limited time modes, Fast Collapse and Close Quarters. The former made the ‘Collapse’ area (i.e. the circular area not covered by the storm) close in much faster, while close quarters removed all Assault Rifles, Tactical Rifles, Snipers and LMGs, leaving only shotguns, SMGs and Pistols available on the map. This new mode, Close Quarters Frenzy, does two in one – both a faster collapse and only SMGs, Pistols and Shotguns in play. It appears this mode is only available in duos for now, so if you are playing as a solo or with with three plus friends, you won’t be put into a Close Quarters Frenzy match. “Submachine guns, Shotguns and Pistols only. Increased collapse speed. Eliminate all enemy players to reach victory.” PC beta is now open also, so all players with Battle.net account can download and jump right now, not just players with early access through a pre-order or code. It gives PC and Xbox players a chance to experience the two LTM’s they missed out on when the beta was PS4 exclusive, albeit this time in a hybrid of them in a single mode.

New close quarters Blackout map ‘Alcatraz’ announced for Black Ops 4 A new map has been confirmed for Call of Duty: Blackout. As previously teased, albeit very subtly, Alcatraz is coming on April 2. New map, NOT location Many Call of Duty fans were expecting a new location added to the existing Blackout map. Treyarch have surprised all, and gone one further, by adding an entirely new Blackout map. The new map will be available on PS4 first, as per the exclusivity deal, and will be available on Xbox One and PC after. Other location, or points of interest, have included Hijacked and more recently Ghost Town. Both of these were added to the original map, therefore Alcatraz is the first Blackout will be played outside of the first map. Depending on the size of Alcatraz, it is possible that the famous prison will still be added to the default Blackout map in the future. How many players will spawn in Alcatraz? The new mode is titled “close quarters combat battle royale” which indicates the map will be a fraction of the size. Whether the game will start with anywhere near the 100 player count is currently unknown. On the Alcatraz introduction trailer, the announcer says “squads redeploying” which suggests the mode could work similarly to the popular Hot Pursuit mode. If this is the case we’d be looking at an upwards limit of 80 players. Blackout free to play In addition to the news of the new Blackout map, it was also announced that Blackout will be free to play from April 2 to April 30. This is for all platforms: PS4, Xbox One and PC. Alcatraz trailer tease The initial Black Ops 4 Operation Grand Heist trailer teased an array of new features in multiplayer and Blackout. These included new characters, weapons and multiplayer maps. Perhaps most notable was the introduction of Hot Pursuit which brought with it various police and getaway vehicles. After highlighting all these features the trailer concluded a quick flash of what else is coming. When freeze framed the trailer shows people gliding in the dark, parachutes over an Alcatraz like structure and finally some sort of zombie within a prison. Call of Duty Instagram Call of Duty fans could have been forgiven for overlooking these subtle hints. However, since then, Call of Duty added a rather less subtle tease on their Instagram. Treyarch also followed suit on their Instagram. Within the story section is an image of Alcatraz and a countdown clock which finished at 1pm PDT, 6pm BST. The co-ordinates of 37.8720N and 122.4230W confirmed the location of Alcatraz.

Five changes that Call of Duty Blackout’s Alcatraz desperately needs After teasing Alcatraz for the better part of a month, Treyarch released the new addition to Call of Duty Blackout on April 2. To the surprise of most, the supposed new location was actually an entirely new map. Changes to Alcatraz map The Alcatraz map and the concept of the game mode has divided Black Ops 4 player’s opinion. Some think it’s a big improvement on the slower-paced, albeit still fast compared to other battle royale games, first Blackout map. Others disagree, thinking Alcatraz is too frantic and the eventual winners are determined less by skill. What is difficult to argue against is that Alcatraz does have a home in Call of Duty Blackout. There will be a group of COD players that prefer close quarter encounters and others who prefer the strategic long range battles. Read More: New Call of Duty Blackout map Alcatraz – number of players, respawns and other details revealed – With that said, Alcatraz may need some fine-tuning to make it a more enjoyable experience. Here are five things that need to be changed now. 1. Slower final circle (collapse) speed Currently, Blackout matches in Alcatraz are often finishing with a good old fashioned heal off. This is far from ideal for any battle royale game and indicates there is something wrong with the design. Be it through players deciding to not engage or being on different floors, the end result of the match are the final two deciding to simply cover up and heal, hoping for the victory. Perks such as consumer and outlander, as well as healing items like trauma kits, are having a bigger effect than the guns themselves. The best and easiest way to fix this is by slowing down the final collapse. This would result in forcing players to engage whereby the player who isn’t in the center of the circle will have to make their way there or face certain death. Furthermore, this would give an advantage to the player who tried to get to the center of the circle. 2. Change the spawn weapon The current setup of spawning with a pistol (with a red dot sight and fast magazine to boot) isn’t necessarily unbalanced. However, it doesn’t suit players who want constant fights, which is most of the lobby in an Alcatraz game. At the moment, landing on someone for a 50/50 fight with a pistol is nowhere near a 50/50 fight, especially when armor is taken into consideration. Of course, it isn’t fair for a spawning player to drop with an ICR, but a Daemon would perhaps be more appropriate. The alternative is for aggressive players to be forced to go to one of the numerous wall buys (which aren’t really guarded) and get a random gun there. Unfortunately, this doesn’t really fit in with the ethos of the Alcatraz map. This is a tricky element to balance, but the current system is just a little bit off. 3. Make parachuting louder In a slight contradiction to point number one, the spawning player’s parachute should be made louder. While the spawning player has a sizable, and perhaps too much of a disadvantage, in a 50/50 gun fight, it is just as frustrating to be landed on by someone in near silence and taken out. Due to the frequency of spawns (every 30 seconds), it is an extremely difficult task to navigate the deathtrap that is Alcatraz, while keeping an eye on the sky for landing enemies. Therefore, some type of warning, ideally in the sound of a parachute, would at least alert the player someone has landed. 4. Get rid of the Zombies! Zombies fit perfectly with the theme of Alcatraz. However, they are incredibly annoying and don’t bring a lot to the table in terms of enjoyment. They’re often an unwanted distraction that take away from the main gameplay element, shooting real enemies. It’s a regular occurrence to kill a zombie (out of necessity) and being killed from behind. An idea to resolve this would be to make the zombie location more concentrated and offer a greater reward for killing them. That way, you can consciously choose to engage rather than be moving through the map and bumping into them. 5. Option to bleed out Arguably the most infuriating part of playing Alcatraz is getting knocked and being left to bleed out. At the start of a game, it can take 60 seconds to bleed out once knocked. This is incredibly annoying as it wastes a whole minute, which is precious time to rack up those kill tallies. There’s an easy fix to this one though, simply add the option to bleed out! It has been made clear that Blackout, and specifically Alcatraz, is a work in progress but these changes would be the first step in improving it. For mobile users skip to 11:37 of the video for when David Vonderhaar discusses this.

Call of Duty Black Ops Pass (aka Season Pass) revealed ahead of launch New details have been revealed about the Call of Duty Black Ops pass for Black Ops 4, which has been commonly known as the Season Pass from previous CoD titles. The Black Ops Pass has been made available for standalone purchase on the GAME UK store, which has listed it for a price of £39.99 ($49.99), which is the same price as the Season Pass from past games. This Pass will include: “Classified,” a bonus Zombies experience, available at launch – 4 additional all-new Zombies experiences – 12 Multiplayer maps – 4 exclusive Blackout characters – With the standalone price for the Black Ops Pass set at $49.99, the best bargain is to purchase the Digital Deluxe Edition of Black Ops 4, which comes with the game and the pass for $99.99, a whole $10 cheaper than if the game and pass were purchased separately. Players who have already pre-ordered the base version of the game, which does not include the Pass, are still able to upgrade before the October 12 launch date, or purchase a separate upgrade once the game is released. The Black Ops Pass will give players access to new, post-launch content that is released throughout the game’s live season for all of the modes. Currently, the Pass comes included with the Digital Deluxe Edition, the Digital Deluxe Enhanced Edition, the Pro Edition, and the Mystery Box Edition of Black Ops 4. The one major change with this year’s Season Pass is that it will be the only way for players to obtain DLC packs, as they will no longer be sold separately. Source – GAME UK

Call of Duty Black Ops dominates best selling games of the decade list TreyarchThe Black Ops series developed by Treyarch was a resounding success for the Call of Duty franchise in the 2010s, with each installment appearing in The NPD Group’s list of the top ten best games of the decade. Hail to the true king of Call of Duty, the Black Ops saga. The Treyarch-developed series lasted almost the entire length of the decade after debuting in 2010, with four total installments releasing over the next ten years. The series left an imprint on the state of Call of Duty and first-person shooters in general, and the proof of that is in its undeniable dominance of the all-decade best selling games list, which also showcased the entire franchise’s impact on the 2010’s. Black Ops 1, 2, and 3 dominated the top five of the “Top Selling Games of the Decade in the US list” provided by The NPD Group, a market research company, and shared by games outlet IGN on Twitter. The first, second, and third Black Ops games came in 2nd, 4th, and 5th, respectively. One of these things is not like the others… pic.twitter.com/B6dzyhaX00 — IGN (@IGN) January 18, 2020 All four games of the Black Ops series made the top ten list, as well as three other Call of Duty titles from the past ten years, in Modern Warfare III (#4), Ghosts (#6), and WWII (#8). That means that of the ten main Call of Duty games that released this decade (excluding Mobile and the MW remaster), seven of them finished in the top ten of the 2010’s. Best selling games of the decade Grand Theft Auto V – Call of Duty: Black Ops – Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 – Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 – Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 – Call of Duty: Ghosts – Red Dead Redemption 2 – Call of Duty: WWII – Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 – Minecraft – That leaves Advanced Warfare, Infinite Warfare, and the newest Modern Warfare outside the top ten, but Modern Warfare did have the best current-generation launch, with over $600 million in sales during opening weekend. Treyarch’s lead developer, David Vonderhaar, wasted little time in flexing on Call of Duty’s decade of dominance, pointing out that only three titles on the list aren’t from the iconic shooter series in Grand Theft Auto V, Red Dead Redemption 2, and Minecraft. 3 of those things. But who is counting. https://t.co/1iXK1NFUDU — Vahn (@DavidVonderhaar) January 18, 2020 For Treyarch, this gives the developer bragging rights when it comes to deciding who the best Call of Duty developer is, as they went 4/4 on games they primarily developed making the top ten in sales list. This momentum should carry them into 2020, but rumors suggest that development of the next Black Ops is already in danger. Despite its strong sales numbers, fans were somewhat disappointed with the end result of Black Ops 4, and don’t want to see the fifth installment rushed out after just one year of Modern Warfare.

Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War trailer, release date, versions, more Activision[jwplayer zMXgrtOu] Activision and Treyarch have finally pulled back the curtains on Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War, and we’ve got everything there is to know about the game’s upcoming release and beta. The annual hype that surrounds the release of a new Call of Duty title is very much in full swing once more, this time for Black Ops Cold War, developed by Treyarch and Raven Software. On August 26, Activision gave their hungry player-base a taste of what to expect with the worldwide reveal of BOCW in Warzone, which included a trailer for the campaign. In addition, the publishers also released quite a bit of information about the game, such as the release date, pricing of all the different versions, next-gen console availability, and more, all of which can be found below. Black Ops Cold War reveal trailer When does Black Ops Cold War release? It’s now been confirmed that BOCW will be available on Friday, November 13, 2020 for the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC. This is the first game in the series to be released in November since WWII in 2017; the last two, Black Ops 4 and Modern Warfare, were rolled out in October. Next-gen availability For those wondering about if and when BOCW will be released for the upcoming PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X, Activision have announced that the game will be available on both next-gen consoles on “day one.” Neither Microsoft nor Sony have yet to announce when their new platforms are coming out, so that information is expected to be revealed later. First look at the official #BlackOpsColdWar box art for PS5 and Xbox Series X! pic.twitter.com/9kCrsv7KaH — Dexerto Esports (@DexertoEsports) August 26, 2020 Versions and pricing There are three versions of Black Ops Cold War that players can start preordering now ahead of the November 13 release: Standard Edition, Cross-Gen Bundle, and Ultimate Edition. Standard Edition PS4, Xbox One, PC – $59.99 – Confrontations Weapons Pack – – Standard Edition (next-gen) PS5, Xbox Series X – $69.99 – Confrontations Weapons Pack – – Cross-Gen Bundle PS4/PS5, Xbox One/Xbox Series X (includes both the current and next-gen versions) – $69.99 – Confrontations Weapons Pack – – Ultimate Edition PS4/PS5, Xbox One/Xbox Series X (includes both the current and next-gen versions), PC – $89.99 – Land, Sea, and Air Packs 3 Operator Skins – 3 Vehicle Skins – 3 Weapon Blueprints – – Battle Pass Bundle (BOCW Season 1 Battle Pass + 20 Tier skips) – Confrontations Weapons Pack – – Here’s a look at what’s included in the Land, Sea, and Air Packs as part of the Ultimate Edition: Activision have also confirmed that those who purchase the Standard Edition for current-gen consoles can upgrade to the next-gen version for $10 at any time, given that the upgraded version is within the same console family (PS4 to PS5, Xbox One to Xbox Series X). Physical copies There will, of course, be physical copies of BOCW available for all four consoles (PC will be only digital). The prices of each version will be the same as listed above, but here’s a rundown on how the upgrade process will work: Physical Standard of PS4 will upgrade to PS5 for $10 – Physical Standard of PS5 only includes PS5 version – Physical Standard of Xbox Series X includes Xbox One copy – Physical Standard of Xbox One cannot upgrade to Xbox Series X – Furthermore, preordering any of these three versions digitally will also include early access to the Open Beta (see below for more details) as well as a cosmetics bundle that includes the iconic character Frank Woods as an Operator and a new assault rifle weapon blueprint. The Frank Woods Operator and AR blueprint can be used immediately in Modern Warfare multiplayer and Warzone. When is the Black Ops Cold War multiplayer reveal? The August 26 reveal was purely for the campaign only, so all information about the game’s multiplayer side of things won’t be made available until Friday, September 9. However, Treyarch did tease the MP with a sneak peek at the very end of the reveal trailer: The end of the #BlackOpsColdWar trailer includes a sneak peek of multiplayer!pic.twitter.com/lpOWdLH7io — Dexerto Esports (@DexertoEsports) August 26, 2020 Black Ops Cold War Open Beta As has been the case with many of the Call of Duty games in recent years, BOCW will have an open beta period for players to try out the game ahead of its release. While the dates for the beta have not yet been announced, Activision have confirmed that it’ll be available first on PS4 for “up to five days in advance,” as part of their deal with Sony. Black Ops Cold War campaign info Of course, the campaign was the major center of focus when it came to the August 26 reveal, as Activision not only showed off the trailer for it but also revealed plenty of details: There are multiple endings – Players can create their own character – Decisions affect the endings – And more! – More about the single-player mode, including the list of characters and missions, can be found in our Black Ops Cold War campaign hub.

Call of Duty Black Ops Cold War teaser trailer confirms reveal date Activision[jwplayer br5AuoVJ] At long last, Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War has been confirmed to be the series’ 2020 title. After a weeklong easter egg hunt in Warzone, an unlisted trailer has finally been discovered that teases the new game and its upcoming reveal date. For months, people have wondered when Call of Duty’s 2020 iteration, a joint effort between Treyarch Studios and Raven Software, would start being revealed. With projectors being sent out, a puzzle of ciphers and bunkers and codes was slowly dismantled over six days — leading ultimately to a trailer deepening hype and officially confirming the game’s leaked title and next reveal date. At the height of the Cold War, KGB defector Yuri Bezmenov issues a chilling warning: “Understand what’s going on around you. You are in a state of war and you have precious little time to save yourself.” He claims a Soviet spy, codename: ‘Perseus’ has infiltrated Western intelligence. His goal: Subvert the U.S. to ensure Soviet dominance in the arms race. To this day, the identity and whereabouts of Perseus remain unknown. “It is a slow process, which we call ‘active measures.” The first stage being demoralization, it takes from 15 to 20 years to demoralize a nation. The next stage is destabilization. What matters is essentials: economy, foreign relations, defense systems. The next stage is crisis. With the violent change of power, structure, and economy, a period of normalization. This is what will happen in the United States if you allow all the schmucks to put a big brother government in Washington D.C., who will promise lots of things, never mind whether the promises are fulfilled or not.” Inspired by actual events. A plan decades in the making. Know your history or be doomed to repeat it. “The time bomb is ticking, with every second, the disaster is coming closer and closer. The danger is real.” Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War. Worldwide reveal: August 26. Bombs and espionage were consistent themes of the easter egg hunt and now we know why. Each day, a VHS tape on the Pawn Takes Pawn website played clips of different news stories during the Cold War, revealing certain numbers, coordinates, and codes. Those coordinates led to locations, unlocked via the codes, and the secret bunkers that lay behind those locked doors led to further clues, including different ciphers that needed to be solved with the assortment of numbers and charts found within Warzone and on Pawn Takes Pawn. On the final, sixth day of the hunt, a nuke was discovered within the bunker near Park. This confirmed many suspicions and subsequent discoveries of new clues allowed the community to eventually decipher all of the puzzles, leading to the unlisted YouTube trailer teaser. Final bunker and we finally have a nuke sighting! 🤯pic.twitter.com/MZc6NLT2FT — Dexerto Esports (@DexertoEsports) August 19, 2020 When is the Call of Duty 2020 worldwide reveal? According to the teaser trailer, the worldwide reveal for Black Ops Cold War will take place on Wednesday, August 26. The exact time has yet to be announced, so make sure to follow us on Twitter @DexertoINTEL as we’ll be providing that information and more as soon as it’s available. However, we do know that the reveal will be in Warzone, based on the video’s description saying “Verdansk. August 26.” It’s been long speculated that this will come in the shape of an in-game event, but we’ll probably get more details as the date gets closer.

Call of Duty Black Ops Cold War reveal date teased in mysterious crates Hayashii[jwplayer QvLAnrCP] It seems like the Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War reveal is closer than ever as Activision have sent out odd packages teasing the yet-to-be-announced game. Call of Duty Black Ops Cold War is one of the worst kept secrets in the video game industry right now. Despite all the numerous leaks (and there has been a lot of them) Activision has yet to officially announce the first-person shooter, even though we have a lot of information about the game. Up until this point, the only confirmation we’ve had is that both Treyarch and Raven Software are working on this year’s title and that it would be revealed soon. Now, it seems like that time is almost here. On August 6, CoD content creator Hayashii and prominent news outlet CharlieINTEL both posted images of a large mysterious box they’d been sent. MANO, seguinte, acabei de receber uma caixa GIGANTE misteriosa do @CallofDuty e que eu só posso abrir dia 10 DE AGOSTO!! Mostrei e expliquei tudo lá nos meus Stories:https://t.co/e7DTBkkEkK pic.twitter.com/YdvNPrgCCx — Hayashii (@HayashiXPG) August 6, 2020 The box itself is pretty boring, with only a set of numbers adorning the top of it (which seems to be different for everyone) and a lock keeping it all together. Aside from that, there’s nothing else to really speak of. A piece of paper also comes with the box that instructs people who received it to not open it until Monday, August 10 at 12 PM EDT (9 AM PDT), meaning fans will have to wait until then to see what’s included. According to CharlieINTEL, a text message will be sent to everyone who’s received a box, revealing the combination for the lock that’s currently keeping these crates shut. Given how the box is designed, this is almost certainly related to Call of Duty Black Ops Cold War, which, if true, means that August 10 is when we’ll finally get our first official glimpse of the game. Keep in mind that no new CoD title has ever been revealed after May 31, so the window for revealing the 2020 game, rolling out a beta, and then launching it is closing fast, if we’re to assume the rumors that it won’t be delayed. Also, recently there have been leaks and rumors suggesting that the game will be revealed in Warzone through some sort of in-game event. According to the Season 6 roadmap, there’s a “mid-season event” scheduled to happen at some point, which lines up with the theory that these crates have something to do with all of that. Of course, none of this won’t be confirmed until August 10, so we won’t know what’s actually going on until then. Make sure to follow us on Twitter @DexertoINTEL as we’ll be bringing you the latest leaks and info regarding the mystery boxes and what they could mean.

Call of Duty Black Ops Cold War open beta & pre-order bonuses leaked Activision[jwplayer br5AuoVJ]New data-mined leaks for Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War reveal evidence of an Open Beta as well as possible pre-order bonuses that could come packaged alongside the blockbuster release. First reported by CODTracker, the leaks reveal more information about the next entry in the Black Ops sub-series including the mention of a Battle Pass that would be a part of a yet-to-be-announced season structure for content. The datamine suggests that players who pre-order Black Ops Cold War will gain early access for the Open Beta, similar to how Activision executed the release for Modern Warfare back in 2019. Just like any other leak, the details or information included could change once the developers actually have the chance to announce their intentions. Black Ops Cold War leaks The Open Beta will let Call of Duty players who pre-purchase the upcoming game experience this year’s title before anyone else. Although the new information didn’t specify if it would be early access to the campaign or multiplayer, it could be the same as MW 2019 that featured a small taster of the action. There were a few different phases of the Open Beta with Modern Warfare. There was the initial playtest meant for streamers and media, followed by wider releases at later dates that included pre-purchase owners of the game. It’s unclear if Treyarch will follow a similar format this time around, but, if the leaks turn out to be real, at least there will be a way for general audiences to log into the game before the Holiday window. Pre-order content for Black Ops Cold War Furthermore, the leaks detailed pre-order bonuses like a ‘Confrontation Weapons Pack,’ the ‘Land, Sea and Air Pack’ and a Season 1 Battle Pass Bundle. The datamine also revealed a ‘Woods Operator Pack in Modern Warfare and Warzone,’ which would introduce the Black Ops star to the franchise’s battle royale component. There are a lot of questions surrounding the upcoming game, and fans are eagerly anticipating the Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War official reveal that will premiere in Warzone on August 26.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 name & logo confirmed for 2024 ActivisionActivision has finally confirmed the name and logo of the 2024 Call of Duty title after months of speculation, with the reveal of Black Ops 6, a continuation of the hugely popular series from developers Treyarch. For a long time, players have believed the name of the new COD game to be Black Ops Gulf War, a successor to 2020’s Black Ops Cold War. At the time this was a departure from the standard naming convention of previous Black Ops games, which were simply numbers 1 through 4. Now, they’re putting things back on track with Black Ops 6, as teasers have started to ramp up exponentially throughout May 2024 in the build-up to the big reveal, which has not yet been given a date. Black Ops 6 will be following on from 2023 entry Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III, which brought back all 16 classic MW2 (2009) maps to the game and has been widely regarded as one of the better COD games of recent years, with more players than 2022’s entry, Modern Warfare II. The Black Ops 6 logo features the famous BO typography, alongside an image of a shield emblazoned with three dogs facing left, right, and forward. The previous numbered Black Ops titles featured Roman numerals instead, though it looks as though Treyarch’s design team have opted to depart from that for BO6. The full reveal will take place on Sunday, June 9, at the Xbox Games Showcase, with a Black Ops 6 Direct immediately following the show. The game is yet to receive an official release date or any real information provided, though there have been plenty of Black Ops 6 leaks in the lead-up to this reveal.

Black Ops 6 launch on Game Pass accidentally leaked by Xbox ActivisionCall of Duty Black Ops 6 is seemingly going to launch on Xbox Game Pass, after a slip-up from Microsoft has given CoD fans a massive heads-up. With the summer approaching, the annual build-up for the new Call of Duty title is in full swing. After months of rumors and leaks, it’s finally been confirmed that it’ll be the sixth installment in the Black Ops series, and take place during the Gulf War period. We’ve started to see teases on social media and inside Warzone too, but now Microsoft has given fans the biggest insight yet, as they’ve seemingly confirmed that the next Black Ops title will be coming to Game Pass on launch day. It came on May 28, as a push notification for the Xbox mobile app read: “Just Announced. Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 is coming to Game Pass on day one later this year!” The notification links to a page on the Xbox website that returns an error message but is clearly set up for a big announcement. Further reports added that the announcement should come at some point soon, possibly later on May 28 or before the month comes to a close. We will know for certain after the Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Direct event, which happens on Sunday, June 9, right after the main Xbox Games Showcase 2024. This is expected to be the first big reveal of gameplay, details about the storyline for single-player mode, and likely some Zombies insight as well. It shouldn’t particularly be a massive shock that Xbox is leveraging its ownership of Activision into using Call of Duty on Game Pass, especially as it’ll bring further interest to the platform. Black Ops 6 will, still, launch on PlayStation and Nintendo despite now being under the Xbox umbrellas. It’s even looking like it’ll be available on PS4 and Xbox One.

Call of Duty®: Black Ops 6 brings everything back we grew up on – FaZe Kalei ActivisionCall of Duty content creator Kalei sat down with Dexerto and explained why the Black Ops series is special and how the upcoming title pays homage to previous instalments. As players gear up for the race to master prestige, Kalei shared her day-one tradition and what the series means to her. From Omnimovement to the traditional prestige system, the content creator highlighted her favorite parts of BO6, and what makes it worthy of the Black Ops name. Kalei What’s your favorite memory from a Black Ops game? “This is SO embarrassing! My favorite memory is genuinely when I was on Black Ops 2 and I dropped a 30-kill game. It’s 2 am in the morning and I scream in my connector mic. I woke my grandma up and she came into my room and was like what are you doing, I’m like ‘oh my god!’” What does the Black Ops series mean to you? “To see all of the hype when it’s a Treyarch game coming out again: That’s what I absolutely love when it comes to the Treyarch games.” Which of the new Black Ops 6 features are you excited about? “I’m so excited for master prestiging to be back. I’m so excited to just grind to get master prestige and race like everyone else. And, I am so excited for round-based Zombies to come back.” Do you have any rituals for day one of a new Call of Duty? “I make sure I get a good sleep beforehand. I make sure all of my ducks are in a row when it comes to things like snacks, drinks. I just hop on and get ready to grind.” Stay tuned for our next expert insight, as we had a chance to talk with Natarsha, who shared their first impressions too and what they’re looking forward to. If you’re as excited for Black Ops 6 as these guys are, you’ll want to preorder online from Gamestop, then head to your nearest Gamestop store for an exclusive steelbook case to add to your collection.