The latest offering from Activision and Infinity Ward in the companies’ long-running and legendary sub-series is Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, and its multiplayer mode is among the most played among any Call of Duty. Unfortunately, with this popularity comes an increase in data-leaks, as hungry fans clamor for more and an apparent army of hackers, data-miners, and leakers struggle to appease them. Modern Warfare has suffered leaks at almost every stage of its production, and it seems like they aren’t going away anytime soon, damaging the community’s ability to properly build hype for it.
RELATED: Call of Duty: Modern Warfare March 3 Update Patch Notes Detail Playlist Changes
The Hype Of Leaks
There are three main types of leak, and each of them can affect a game and its community in different ways. The first are accidental, where bugs in the code of an existing project can reveal hidden filen or press releases contain more information than the publishers intended. The second type are marketing leaks and cover anything that has been “purposefully” leaked by the publishers to help stoke up hype to further accidental slip-ups.
It’s the third type of leak however that Modern Warfare has been particularly suffering from, especially with regards to its unannounced Battle Royale mode, Warzone. This type is the third-party leak, where a hacker, data-miner, or even an employee has found and revealed information about the game that isn’t meant to be publicly available. Beyond a teaser and a locked menu option, Activision have released almost no information about its upcoming battle royale. Instead, everything we know about Warzone, including its name, is leaked information.
There seem to be no limits to the kind of data that these Modern Warfare leakers can get their hands on, with specific details about gameplay mechanics in Warzone and the map being freely available. The only thing Activision can do to fight back is bringing down these leaks on social media and subpeona-ing Reddit for the identity of the leakers. A task that is not so simple. Furthermore, while this is upsetting, Activision is not the villain here for content finding itself out in the open sooner than expected, though it hasn’t quite helped the situation.
A handful of glitches in the CoD code, coupled with the fact that the developers have already begun adding elements from Warzone to the game, haven’t done the company any favors, though. Already a group of players have been accidentally transported into the Battle Royale’s tutorial, while another managed to bug his way into the locked Warzone menu, revealing even more hints as to its gameplay structure. Another concern is how there has been a “Classified” and “Transmission Incoming” screen in-game for longer than most would expect, an issue if alone that wouldn’t be the end of the world. Coupled with these leaks, however, and these glitches, long teases, and slip-ups are just the icing on the cake that is Warzone leaks.
RELATED: Call of Duty: Modern Warfare Player Discovers Hidden Cyber Attack Feature
An Unexpected Disappointment
The relentless stream of Call of Duty leaks may not have been what Activision wanted, but it’s certainly done a lot of work building hype for Warzone. This excitement has been building for weeks, helped on by the few official moves that Activision have made to support all the leaks. So, when the publisher teased that an exciting reveal would be coming on March 3rd, the community naturally assumed that it would be the long-awaited official announcement of Warzone. Many thought “how could it not be when the new battle royale was the focus all the hype driven by the leaks and official teases?”
On March 3rd, excitement in the community was at a fever pitch, and then Activision made the announcement… Tomogunchis, cute virtual pets attached to a watch that Operators could wear were coming to the blood-soaked battlefields of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare. Needless to say, the community backlash was both immediate and dramatic.
Any announcement that wasn’t Warzone was going to come under fire, which was pretty muchclear from the hype that had been generated. However, the Tomogunchis may have been the worst possible thing Activision could have announced in its place. Clearly based on Tamagotchis, the handheld digital pets first created in Japan in the late 90s, the Tomogunchis can be fed, have their moods monitored, and can even be evolved. Not exactly what hardcore Call of Duty fans, ready for an exciting new game mode, were hoping for.
The Tomogunchi
While the cutesy addition to Modern Warfare’s otherwise straight-laced multiplayer has been welcomed by some fans as a fun change of pace, others see the Tomogunchis as just another pointless stat to track. Though the fact is that whichever camp players are in, its announcement right now shouldn’t come as a surprise. Even before the launch of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, it was revealed that the game would feature a tamagotchi-style virtual pet at some point. This was further supported in January when a player managed to get their hands on the item, albeit a non-functional version, thanks to a store error.
Anyone following Modern Warfare’s many leaks and occasional official announcement had a fair chance of guessing that this reveal might be the Tomogunchi, not Warzone. This fact seems to have done little to cool their ire, however, as fans have taken to Twitter and Reddit to express their anger and disappointment with the update. What Activision’s response will be remains to be seen, but unless it finally owns up to Warzone being under production, it seems unlikely that it’ll be enough, something that is practically unfair to hold over the company’s head.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare is out now for PC, PS4, and Xbox One.
MORE: Dr DisRespect May Have Just Teased the Call of Duty: Modern Warfare Warzone Release Date
