Duty‘s battle royale War zone is just under a year old. When it launched in March 2020, I. praised the online game for 150 players for smooth gameplay, simplified mechanics and fast action. But all the functions ever created War zone one of the best Battle Royales to fall into, now feels bothered by the wreckage created by recent updates. As it looks now, War zone is a rough mess of bugs, cheaters and weapon balancing issues.
Keeping up with the trend of games as a live service, piling up on constant updates for a huge game like War zone can be a blessing as well as a curse. New content keeps the game fresh with new weapons, modes and cosmetics. But every time something is added to the game, something else seems to break.
Late last year War zone plagued by one for many weeks unlimited juggernaut glitch, allowing players to spawn an infinite number of juggernaut killstreaks. The juggernaut suit consists of heavy armor and allows the player to wield a minigun, making for a frustrating battle royale experience when dealing with just one or two of those threats. Fortunately, this malfunction has been resolved for the time being. But some old glitches have resurfaced, including the stim shot flaw.
The stim shot is a piece of tactical equipment used for healing, but it is abused with an exploit that gives a player continuous and infinite healing. This allows players to stand up War zone‘s poisonous gas that would otherwise cause imminent death, and outshines all other opponents for unfair victories. Developer Raven Software tweeted that the problem with the stim injection was fixed with a patch last week, but some players continue to report misuse of the equipment.
A long-term problem that has not been addressed is loadout freeze. Many players have reported their game stalling for a few seconds after trying to collect their loadout drop, leaving them vulnerable on the map. I have not personally encountered this problem but it seems to be popping up quite a bit for others.
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Gunfights have also been tough since December 16, when the developers took it Black Ops Cold War guns in the Modern warfare-based War zone. Dumping all those extra weapons into the mix created bugs and balance issues. Cold WarThe DMR 14 tactical rifle soon became available War zoneThe most overwhelmed pistol, dominates the meta, followed closely by the double Diamatti pistols and the MAC-10 submachine gun. An update on January 13th yielded nerfs for both the DMR 14 and the Double Diamattis, but they are both still powerful weapons, especially since the pistols to feel completely unchanged.
On the other hand, the DMR has 14 nerf players branching out to try and find the next best weapon for long-range firefights. I still see a lot of players running and shooting with the MAC-10 and Diamattis, but it’s nice to see a slightly better variety of weapons in the game. Modern warfareThe CR-56 AMAX assault rifle is my favorite go-to-for War zone, and it feels like it could be another contender without the DMR meta in play.
There also is a reloading problem that can happen with some of the integrated weapons. You can reload a gun and watch the animation happen, but sometimes the weapon doesn’t actually reload. This has cost me my life in more than a few gunfights using the Cold War weapons in War zone.
Some players want the Cold War guns to be removed from War zone, but I think the guns just need a good balance. Of course it is worth noting that if War zone remains the bridge connecting the future Duty titles, the pool of weapons and equipment can become an overwhelming mess. I think Duty would do well to take a page out Fortnite, skip certain weapons to maintain game balance and keep things fresh. I can understand the reluctance to jump weapons that players have bought cosmetics for, but it would be less of a problem to skip an item like the stim shot so players don’t have a chance to abuse it.
Aside from item issues, cheating is still involved War zone. Activision started fighting against cheaters in Modern warfare and War zone in April last year, but nothing seems to stop the influx of wallhacks and get rid of match integrity. All players can really do is report the cheater from within the in-game option, but reviewing Activision and banning from accounts doesn’t seem to matter; cheaters just create new accounts. Last May, Activision added a two-factor authentication requirement for all new ones War zone accounts on PC. But hackers are good at finding workarounds, and they still shamelessly cheat. Nobody wants to deal with cheaters, and many content creators and professionals are quite fed up.
In terms of integrity in it War zoneIn the competitive scene, prize money tournaments are often compromised, with players finding ways to bypass the game’s skill-based matchmaking and getting placed in “bot lobbies” of less-trained players. Multiple methods have been exposed including specific routers to ping locations or using accounts with reverse boosted statistics. The current Twitch Rivals Doritos Bowl is the first major War zone tournament since the Black Ops Cold War integration with private lobbies to avoid discrepancies with skill-based matchmaking. Hopefully all future competitions will feature private lobbies, especially those big money tournaments.
Besides all these bigger problems, one small criticism I have is that Verdansk’s map is old. I have been complaining for a long time that there is so much untapped potential in the landscape of Verdansk. Instead of getting Verdansk map updates for season one, we have a second map: the smaller, Cold War-theme “Rebirth Island.” A smaller map does add some variety in terms of the scenery and pace of the matches, and I often enjoy the faster, high-kill matches over the slower, campy matches at Verdansk. While I still don’t think it all needs the same bells and whistles as the larger Verdansk map, Rebirth Island is now my preferred option for War zone matches.
All the complaints here are not meant to say that War zone can’t be a fun time, but it can often be ruined by bugs or cheats that shouldn’t remain as constant factors in an online shooter. I dumped in it for countless hours War zone, and I want it to remain my favorite battle royale, but now it’s too rough to enjoy in its current state. I’d love to see a massive update that focuses only on clearing the bugs and balancing the weapons, which is more important than just cramming in new cosmetics or adding temporary modes. War zone needs some TLC to get back to the fantastic form it launched last year.