Season 4 of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, which includes the popular battle royale game mode Warzone, will officially drop on Wednesday at 11 p.m. PT. Be ready: The update will vary from 34.7 gigabyte on console to 49.7 gigabyte on PC. The one-minute trailer for Season 4 released in late May included talk of large-scale weapons. I wonder if that means different weapons with varying effects in Warzone (hopefully to better deal with those OP trucks?).
Either way, with Season 4 of Modern Warfare on the horizon, here are a few things I'd love to see introduced either in this update or future ones:
An open stadium: The map is well put-together -- not too many complaints there. But I'd love to see the stadium opened up so you can land in it. Give me a football or soccer stadium where you can run around and battle on the field or in the stands.
Pick up your downed teammates: One of your teammates gets downed? You now have the opportunity to pick them up and bring them to safety before reviving them, instead of trying to do so in view of the enemy, where they often are after being downed in the first place. Fortnite has this mechanic working nicely. As much as I want to see other BR titles adopt a Gulag-type last-chance system, I'd love Warzone to adopt the wounded teammate carry.
Powerful weapon pickups: Give me a new OP weapon that is extremely rare to find. Something to combat pesky trucks barreling at you, or helicopters in the sky. Maybe a one-time use tactical nuke for players camping in a house or a roof for several circles. Similar to how propane tanks and other weapons have been introduced in Fortnite to destroy structures, give players a hard-to-find but effective way to get campers out of their spots.
Better cheat detection: Get the hackers and bots out of here! If there's one thing VALORANT is doing better than other FPS titles, it's Vanguard and cheat detection. Maybe it's working a little TOO well, because it's detecting things that have nothing to do with cheating. But hacking continues to be a major concern in Warzone, and when you get to a certain level, it definitely takes the fun out of the game. Hopefully Season 4 has some bigger measures taken to counteract this.
There's been some talk of Blackout returning in the upcoming COD 2020 game release. Naturally, COD BR isn't the focus of the game (even though you could argue it's the star of Modern Warfare in both player base and fanfare), and we know we're getting a new COD release every year, with different developers involved, but this means a whole new game install and a totally different title, unlike other BR updates that happen to the same base game.
I wonder how many people will continue to play Warzone after the new BR is dropped and what the reception will be, especially with the precedent that Warzone has set? What will content creators do after the game drops and the honeymoon phase is over? Original Blackout creators have flocked to Warzone, and certainly they will either play out of curiosity and capitalize on the newness of the game or be paid Activision marketing dollars to do so. But after that first month, will it keep the big names in the content game around? That remains to be seen.
Watch Search and Destroy every Wednesday at 6 p.m. ET on ESPN Esports' Twitch channel.
Some quick hits today from a week of turmoil and change across the world.
In a June 1 tweet, Season 4's release was initially pushed back, announced on the Call of Duty Twitter account, saying "now is not the time." Battle Royale players and entities from across titles continue to publicly show support for #BlackLivesMatter and the ongoing protests across the country.
Developers have taken it one step further and have postponed upcoming announcements or releases. The Minnesota ROKKR did the same, in concert with the Call of Duty League to push the home series weekend to this weekend with a strong fundraising component for #BlackLivesMatter and community efforts. Warzone Weekend also will make a return.
Wednesday morning I was watching Timthetatman's Just Chatting stream on Twitch. Aside from learning that he once bought a television from Best Buy for $10,000 (and they apparently use him as an example at company conferences on how to up-sell), he also brushed off a comment calling him out about playing more Warzone than VALORANT. Tim dismissed the comment. At the end of the day, he will play what he wants -- no matter what he's playing, people just like him. It will be interesting, though, now that Twitch drops are not a factor and the game is in full release, who will continue on with it and who will come back to BR titles for content. Hiko seems to be in the best position to occupy the top streamer crown in VALORANT at the moment, as he is pulling great viewership in a great content house at 100 Thieves and is a pro player. How many streamers and content creators will continue to incorporate VALORANT into their workloads? We shall see. I will guess a lower amount than we would expect. BR lends itself to much more exciting content for non-pros.
A little levity for those looking for it: I have no idea why Tfue blew up that picture challenge on Twitter. I don't think I want to know.