Call of Duty’s content drought, which only just recently turned a month old, is turning more and more players of Warzone against the game that once dominated the space.
In a Jan. 12 Reddit thread, Warzone players gathered together to discuss what’s gone wrong with CoD’s battle royale, framed around a screenshot that showed Warzone with 27,000 viewers on Twitch, dwarfed by Marvel Rivals’ 204,000.
Most interestingly, and perhaps troublingly for CoD, is that the viewership on Rivals often features several notable streamers who have found or built their success off of Warzone. Top CoD players like Scump, TeePee, Nadeshot, and others have all been regularly streaming Marvel’s hero shooter. And you can bet everyday gamers have been doing the same, too.
Because it’s not just viewership on Twitch. The player count difference is (Tony) stark, too. Checking Steam today, Warzone has just over 51,000 players while Rivals holds nearly 200,000, and it fluctuates each day.
As for what’s happened with Warzone, the top comment had a one-word answer for the state of CoD right now: “Greed.” And many players agreed with the sentiment, although I think it’s way more complicated than that.
Firstly, Warzone is in something of a dry spell right now compared to what CoD players are used to, while Marvel Rivals is a new game that’s very popular and just launched its first season. Season two of BO6 and Warzone begins in two weeks, and regardless of what the new content contains, players will be back.
Is CoD in trouble of losing some of its players to other games? Sure. But if anything has proven consistently correct the past two decades, it’s that CoD players enjoy CoD and will come back to CoD, regardless of the state of the game. But its ongoing cheating issues and server problems may just continue to slant the pattern of new players vs. those moving on.
“The exodus first and foremost comes from cheaters, bugs, and desync, ignored by Activision,” one player said in the thread. “If these were not there, we all would still be playing the game, bitching at EOMM (engagement-optimized matchmaking), but playing.”
Activision has not done itself any favors by going radio silent over the holiday season amid mounting complaints about cheaters and connection problems, but it’s expected that the company will begin comms once again soon with season two set to begin in a few weeks.
CoD will also hope to re-capture Warzone’s glory by bringing back the classic map Verdansk soon, likely in season three some time this spring.
Published: Jan 13, 2025 01:17 pm