Like a zipline descending into Verdansk, the quality curve of the Call of Duty campaign trends ever downward, year-on-year. Or so a casual observer might assume. But this is Task Force 141, soldier: we don’t do casual observation. Take my binoculars and you’ll soon see that the real story is far more complicated and compelling.
For every Ghosts in the graveyard of CODs past, there’s an unlikely space adventure to rival Titanfall. And no matter how many times Captain Price tells you to let ‘em pass, there’s always an experimental RTS mechanic or Hitman-lite stealth mission waiting around the next corner. Call of Duty has been far more brave and changeable than it’s given credit for, and while the best ideas haven’t always stuck, they’re still very much playable. What’s more, they rarely outlast a weekend - which counts for a lot in an age of life-consuming AAA releases.
Over 20 years of service, I’ve played every single COD campaign, and can share my intel freely with allies like you. So hop in for a ride through the ups and downs of the series. Just don’t take the helicopter - those things never land softly around here.
]]>The mythical CX-9 SMG has finally been added to Warzone! This compact Modern Warfare weapon has been in the game files for a while now, and once briefly appeared as floor loot due to a bug. Now, it’s finally available for all players to unlock in Warzone and Modern Warfare multiplayer. If you need help acquiring it, we’ve got you covered with our guide on how to unlock the CX-9 in Warzone.
]]>A lawsuit filed in Texas court alleges that Activision and Infinity Ward committed copyright infringement when creating the character Mara in 2019 reboot Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare. The lawsuit was brought by writer and photographer Clayton Haugen, who claims that Mara infringes a character he created called "Cade Janus". The real-life model for both Mara and Cade Janus are the same person, Alex Zedra, an actress and Twitch streamer.
]]>Looking for the very best Assault Rifle in Call Of Duty: Warzone Caldera? We're not surprised: Assault Rifles are by far the most versatile and numerous weapons class in Warzone. They are reliable, effective at any range, and the backbone of the vast majority of Warzone Caldera loadouts out there.
Our guide to the best AR in Warzone will walk you through the stats and relative power of all the Assault Rifles in Warzone. Here’s all the assault rifles in Call Of Duty: Warzone, and how good each of them are in the current meta.
]]>Want to know the best Sniper Rifle in Warzone Caldera? Sniper Rifles have always dominated Warzone and its sprawling, rooftop-dotted landscape. Now the landscape has shifted over to the more tropical Caldera with the arrival of Warzone Pacific - but still, Snipers remain as deadly and relevant as ever.
No matter how much the meta shifts, the power of one-shot headshots means they will always have a role. So the question is: which sniper rifle do you use for that perfect headshot? Below we'll walk you through our picks for the best Sniper Rifle in Warzone, along with detailed overviews and stats on each weapon in this essential gun class.
]]>On Rebirth Island in Call of Duty: Warzone there’s a bright yellow door that leads to a mysterious bunker, but how do you get in? And what’s the reward? Below I’ve put together a guide which explains how to complete the Rebirth Island Easter Egg in Warzone.
]]>Activision have revealed the content roadmap for Call Of Duty: Black Ops Cold War and Warzone's first season which kicks off on 10th December. It promises a slew of free weapons, maps, and modes for Blops as well as a mysterious "Classified Warzone Experience". Although, it's all largely non-specific info. Thankfully Gunfight mode is making a comeback, which I'm pretty darn excited for.
]]>We already know that Activision are planning to inject their free-to-play battle royale 'em up Call Of Duty: Warzone with content from the next not-free game Call Of Duty: Black Ops Cold War. Activision have now given a rough timeline, saying that Verdansk will begin adding Cold War content when Black Ops season one launches in December.
]]>Looking for the best shotgun in Warzone Caldera? Shotgun balance is in a bit of a tenuous spot for the moment. Historically, Warzone shotguns cannot one-shot a player with full armor (250 total HP). However, game integration is a messy process, and some Vanguard builds that enable one-shot kills have slipped through the cracks. As a result, the Vanguard options are wildly overpowered at the moment. The situation is totally out of line with the game’s longstanding balance philosophy, so we expect all of these to be nerfed shortly. When that happens, we’ll update these rankings to reflect the new ecosystem.
]]>Well well, Call Of Duty: Warzone is jumping in on spooky time with its very own horror-themed update. The Hunting Of Verdansk is a biggo event beginning tomorrow, October 20th. It'll bring new limited-time game modes, treats to hunt down, and apparently cosmetic skins from Saw and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Well I won't accuse them of doing anything in half measure.
]]>Looks like a data miner has potentially discovered footage of Warzone's new map within Call Of Duty: Black Ops Cold War's files. Someone posted four short clips over on Reddit which show multiplayer maps coming to Cold War, but their file names each begin with "wz_" which suggests they'll be reused as locations in the Warzone map. We may need to get our skiis on.
]]>If there's one thing I need right now, it's storage space on a hard drive to install plenty of games without fuss. Infinity Ward have taken note and they're releasing a patch later today for Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare which will allow players to uninstall specific modes.
]]>Alongside numerous hackers, players in Call Of Duty: Warzone have had to contend with a new exploit which granted infinite healing. How fun! Players who used the Stim item could repeatedly juice up, letting them live in the deadly gas and wait while everyone else blasted each other to death. Good news, though, Infinity Ward have fixed the issue which should mean no more immortal gas dwellers.
]]>Boots on the ground. Hah, “boots on the ground”. That’s so last gen, so, I don’t know, basic. Armored Royale is the hotness in Call of Duty: Warzone right now, and it’s all about boots on the clutch. It's a mode in which you care and nurture for an armored truck like it’s your child. As long as it stays alive, your team can respawn back into its waiting, metal embrace. If it explodes in a hail of shrapnel, your ability to respawn is severed. And thus, you must roam Verdansk vulnerable and shaken without your big four-wheeled boy. So, it's important to keep your truck well maintained - as the old saying goes, "the team with their truck still in tow often wins, hoo-ah!".
]]>Looking for the best MP5 loadout in Warzone? The MP5 in Warzone has been a staple since Modern Warfare's release, and in Warzone things are no different. Really, all that’s changed in the last 16 months is the addition of the Cold War MP5. Surprise, surprise; it’s also very, very good. Both MP5s are excellent choices in the current Warzone meta. The Modern Warfare MP5 has slightly faster time-to-kill and lower recoil, while the Cold War MP5 has much better mobility. No matter which one you choose, we’ve got you covered with our guide to the best MP5 loadout in Warzone Pacific for each gun.
]]>Looking for the best Marksman Rifle in Warzone? Marksman rifles have a slightly strange spot in the Warzone meta. The semi-automatic and single-action weapons in the class function completely differently from one another, and are hard to compare directly. However, it’s clear that the more sniper-like options are head and shoulders above the rest.
So, what is the role of the Marksman Rifle in Warzone? The bolt-action weapons, the Kar98k and SP-R 208, function like Sniper Rifles and can find a lot of success in that role. The rest… are mostly just good for a good time. We’ll break down each weapon in the category and how to use them, and explain why the bolt-actions are so good and the rest are, frankly, so bad.
]]>I consider myself quite the all-rounder when it comes to playing games. I've sampled a little bit of what sometimes feels like every game ever made during my five-squared years on this earth. And yet somehow, inconceivably, before last year's Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare I'd never played a CoD game before. I've no idea how it happened (or didn't happen), but it did (or didn't).
Then, as if to make up for all that lost time, the CoD Gods dropped Call Of Duty: Warzone on me a scant few months later. And in a twist of irony, I've played very few games since.
]]>It's about time Call Of Duty: Warzone got a cowboy, all the cool video games have cowboys. Warzone today adds a new operator named Morte - a former Italian soldier with a Wild West dress sense rivalling that of Overwatch's McCree. He's played by a pretty popular Italian actor, singer and rapper called Fabio Rovazzi, who was invited to Infinity Ward to get scanned into the game after meeting one of the devs at a comic convention.
]]>Update: After two-and-a-half days, vehicles are back.
If you're looking forward to unwinding after work today by hopping in a party wagon with the lads and shouting "Oi oiii!" while buzzing nerks in Call Of Duty: Warzone, bad news: the game has no vehicles right now. The developers, Infinity Ward have temporarily removed all vehicles, presumably because of crashes they've been causing - crashing the whole server, that is. No word yet on when they'll return.
]]>As tired a phrase as "they must be hacking" is when getting bested in competitive shooters, sometimes other players really are cheating. There will be fewer of those now, at least for the time being, thanks to a lawsuit brought by Activision against a website selling cheat tools for Call Of Duty: Warzone and other Call Of Duty games.
]]>Yesterday, Call Of Duty: Warzone and Modern Warfare got a big update that levelled up Season 5 to Season 5 Reloaded. It's still the same Season as far as battle passes and things are concerned, but it's added a new game mode for the battle royale called King Slayer, which is basically a big team deathmatch inside the battle royale arena. The update also prepped the games for the upcoming summer event kicking off on Friday, which will bring even more modes. What a treat.
]]>A wee balance patch has dropped into Call Of Duty: Warzone (and Modern Warfare too, obvs), with the most notable change a nerf of an all-round super-murder machinegun, the Bruen Mk9. With a cut to its damage range, maybe it's back down closer to regular-murder status. A few other weapons got tweaked too: the FAL, M91, and Holger-26. And some bugs got fixed. Not a giant patch, but one you'll want to know about to inform your murderplans.
]]>Season five of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare and Warzone is out tomorrow, so here’s a release trailer to make your fingers itch. Imogen went over all of the operators and guns last week, but Warzone in particular is my jam so I’m focusing on that.
Yep, there’s a train coming to Verdansk, and I’m already making space on my hard-drive for this rolling stock of death. The trailer also gives us a look inside the stadium, and has the surprise inclusion of what appears to be a raven assassination.
]]>There's a sneaky-sounding new faction joining the fray in Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare and Warzone next week, and they're bringing some new weapons and operators with them. They're called Shadow Company, which is a name you may recognise if you're familiar with Modern Warfare 2. I'm not really sure what the lore implications of that are, but hey, even if there aren't any, they're at least bringing along three new characters for you to play when Season 5 launches on August 5th next week.
]]>The SCAR’s in an odd spot in Warzone. It doesn’t really occupy any space, in fact, you could say it’s floating in limbo. There isn’t anything it excels at, or a feature which sets it apart from any other assault rifle. It simply exists, with one major flaw which, if fixed, could mean an emergence into the meta.
]]>The AX-50 is the favourite sniper of many Warzone players, but how do you kit it out perfectly for your loadout?
]]>Often overlooked, the P90’s actually pretty good in Warzone you know. It’s easy to handle, has a huge magazine size, fast fire rate, and its iron sights are very nice indeed.
]]>The PP19 Bizon isn’t everyone’s go-to SMG in Warzone, but this doesn’t mean it’s a slouch in the close to mid range department - far from it. This thing has an enormous ammo capacity so you rarely need to worry about reloading in the middle of a gunfight, it’s easy to handle, has decent iron sights, and pretty good damage numbers.
]]>In a similar vein to the Uzi, the Striker 45 in Warzone isn’t a close range monster, but more of a mid to long range contender. It’s also home to a number of unique attachments and configurations, one of which turns it into a burst fire weapon that rivals even the FAMAS.
]]>You wouldn’t think it, but in Warzone the Uzi’s a solid mid to long range SMG that’ll serve you well in most cases. It’s easy to control, accurate, and has a fairly solid fire rate - just avoid hip fire, it doesn’t do well on this front.
]]>The Oden’s always been a monstrous thing, an unwieldy beast with limited ammo, slow fire rate, huge recoil but enormous damage numbers. This makes it one of the most difficult Assault Rifles to use in Warzone, and it feels more like a mixture between a Sniper Rifle and an LMG when lugging it around.
]]>Ever since Warzone’s Reloaded Season 4 update, the FAL has suddenly become a viable option both at long and close ranges - particularly close. This is thanks to its absurdly high damage numbers at short range with two tap kill potential if you hit those headshots.
]]>The Rytec AMR is somewhat reminiscent of the Barrett .50 Cal from previous Call of Duty games. However, this one has some cool attachments, including explosive and thermite rounds to completely shred enemies at all ranges, as well as take out vehicles. We've been playing around with it and have put together the best loadout for Warzone featuring the Rytec AMR for you.
]]>With the Crossbow in Warzone, you'll be able to one-shot baddies and take chunks of their armour off with a surprising amount of ease. However, it's a bit of a slog to unlock, especially in Warzone.
]]>War, the crafty old bugger, has changed yet again. When you queue up for "quad" mode in Call Of Duty: Warzone, you'll now have to battle (royale) it out amongst 199 other players. That's 48 extra, and Warzone's map certainly seems big enough to accommodate them. The solo, duo and trio modes all still only go up to 150.
The "Season Four Reloaded" update has also chucked in a new contract, a sniper rifle, and a separate spotter's scope item that lets you peek at distant hills without having to worry about glint giving you away. There's an upcoming new mode where someone gets to have a go with a mini-gun and put on fancy "Juggernaut" pants, too. I think. These are some very confusing patch notes.
]]>There are a couple of ways to get your stats in Warzone. Warning: You might find out more than you want to know about your ability compared to the rest of the playerbase.
]]>We're a week into Season 4 of Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare (and its battle royale partner Call Of Duty: Warzone). But as the dust settles on some of this season's wilder changes, Infinity Ward reckon it's time for a long-overdue shake-up of the game's weapons as part of their upcoming mid-season update - one that threatens to finally knock one particular rifle off the top spot.
]]>Season 4 of Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare is finally here. With a download size that's practically bursting at the seams, Infinity Ward's new season of shootmen brings updated playlists, a new battle pass and post-Gold mastery challenges to the Modern Warfare arsenal. Meanwhile, Call Of Duty: Warzone's battle royale has been buffed up with 50-a-side firefights and three new mid-game events - including a healthy dose of prison abolition.
]]>In yet another show of words, Activision and Infinity Ward have updated Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare with a new loading screen proclaiming Black Lives Matter. This follows two other attempts to show support for those protesting the death of George Floyd and police violence in the United States and around the world that disproportionately affects Black people.
]]>The start of Season 4 in Call Of Duty: Warzone and Modern Warfare, due to happen on Wednesday, is postponed. On a night when protests in the USA continued over the police killing of George Floyd, the makers said "now is not the time."
]]>Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare is queuing up for season 4 with a teaser video featuring an unnamed "senior operator" in a blurry comms interception. Wait, even I recognize that hat. Looks like yer boy Captain Price is going to play a part in Warfare season 4, possibly as a new operator for Warzone.
]]>Your secondary weapon slot in Warzone often comes in clutch in a huge number of sitiuations. Running out of ammo and needing to switch, getting a bit of close-quarters damage, or even using as a primary weapon if you're feeling tough.
]]>War never changes, but sometimes the optional mid-war missions do get swapped around. That's actually quite common. Developers Infinity Ward briefly added Most Wanted contracts to Warzone last month, wiping over a different type of mission that I really liked. Fortunately, they quickly swapped them back around - and more fortunately still, yesterday's update lets us have both. Great! Thanks for that.
The update also smuggled in assault rifles and SMGs to the Gulag, and you'll now find SKS carbines dotted around the main map. There are a couple new maps for plain old Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare, too. Oh, and you can now open those mysterious bunkers - and some players have found a nuke buried beneath one of them. Just thought you might want to know.
]]>Call Of Duty: Warzone has a cheating problem. That much is clear. And like many other free-to-play games, part of that problem is that bans don't mean much when you can fire up a new account in seconds. To stop these particular miscreants from popping up again and again, Warzone has introduced mandatory 2FA on all new free accounts on PC.
]]>Fancy a 1v1 match on Shipment? Of course not. Duels to the death are played out and boring. Subscribing to the view that bigger is indeed always better, Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare has brought back its 10v10 Shipment playlist. After briefly appearing as an April Fool's jab, Infinity Ward have decided to make 20-player brawls on the game's teeniest, tiniest map a more permanent fixture.
]]>Should I just, like, stop posting about the parts of Call Of Duty: Warzone I enjoy? First, they took my Bounty Contracts (though they've since put them back). Now they've taken away the bloody helicopters.
Infinity Ward haven't said why, but it's probably because people were exploiting a glitch that let them buzz about beneath the map, killing people.
]]>There is a lot to praise about Call Of Duty: Warzone. I like the map. I like the helicopters. I like the mid-game missions, even though Infinity Ward just removed the best type. The vehicles in general, though, deserve more attention.
I'd like you to enjoy these videos in particular, where two players park their helicopters on top of each other while another downs an entire squad with their quad bike.
]]>Look, maybe I'm overreacting, but seeing this did genuinely just make me do a high-pitched yelp at my screen, so I'm going to run with that emotion. Call Of Duty: Warzone's latest update has removed Bounty Contracts from the game. These were optional in-game missions where you had to hunt down a player from an enemy squad. You were told roughly where they were, and they were told you were coming. They were great. I wrote a whole article specifically praising them.
They've been replaced by "Most Wanted" Contracts, where your location gets revealed to everyone on the map. If you survive, all your dead squadmates get respawned. They sound neat, but... I want both. Why can't I have both?
]]>The Flaming Throwing Knife is a new piece of Lethal equipment available in Modern Warfare and Warzone. Here’s how to get your pyromaniac on.
]]>From today until Monday, you'll be able to play some of Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare's multiplayer for free. This trial is actually taking place inside CoD: Warzone, their free-to-play battle royale game, with five Modern Warfare team deathmatch maps going on a special playlist. So if you're already playing Warzone, you're now invited to try its bigger, more expensive brother.
]]>I remember playing a Counter-Strike map in 2001 called fy_iceworld. It was a small simple grey killbox of a map that virtually anyone could’ve made within the first few hours of downloading the editor tools.
fy_iceworld quickly became one of the most popular and divisive CS maps at my school. I was, of course, one of the haters. I tried to convince my friends to vote against fy_iceworld on our local internet cafe’s CS server, but they argued that I was just salty about being bad at it (which was partly true) and they forced the mapchange anyway. Similar conversations played out across countless clan servers, cyber cafes, PC bangs, and LAN parties around the entire world.
To properly gauge fy_iceworld’s influence and legacy, I asked several working level designers for their takes. Should we love it or bury it?
]]>Like the sort of macabre bragging right that has you somewhat proud of your hometown's staggering crime rates, we've sure got a few cheaters over here on PC. At least, that seems to increasingly be the view of the folks stuck playing Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare with us over crossplay. Now, it seems some would rather brave the long queue times of running and gunning on their own platform that risk facing off against PC's home-grown hackers.
]]>War never changes, but the number of people who are allowed to participate occasionally increases. Call Of Duty: Warzone is upping squad sizes to four. You can still queue separately for the version with three, if you like, and new weapons and modes are planned for later on.
This is part of Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare's Season 3, which means that we've also got a couple new guns, three new regular multiplayer maps, and a truckload of cosmetic nonsense attached to the new battle pass.
]]>The long-awaited Call Of Duty: Warzone has finally arrived, people. We've heard rumours for months of the upcoming Modern Warfare Battle Royale and all its shiny new features, from 150-player matches to contracts and the infamous Gulag... but for those who are out of the loop, we'll walk you through how to play Call Of Duty: Warzone below, and give you a primer on everything you can expect in this brand new FPS experience.
]]>I won the very first game I played of Call Of Duty: Warzone Solos last night. It was tense, frequently frantic, and above all an excellent lesson in how the shift from Squads to Solos changes everything, from weapon choices to playstyles and more. Our Call Of Duty: Warzone Solos tips will help you quickly get your bearings in this brand new mode, so you can give yourself the best chance of winning the match and sending everyone who crosses your path to the Gulag.
]]>We've been fighting to be the last person standing for years now, so new battle royale games have to bring something fresh to the war table. After largely bouncing off Blackout, I didn't think I'd find that in Call Of Duty: Warzone. Then me and my friends found a helicopter and a Bounty Contract, and I was delighted to discover I was wrong.
]]>If your friends are all offline and you're tired of squading up with randoms, rejoice! You can now play solo in Call of Duty: Warzone. Solos mode will still have a total of 150 players dropping into Verdansk so you'll be trading squad support for even more competition. If you're into lone wolfing it, now is your time to shine.
]]>The 1v1 fights in Call Of Duty: Warzone's Gulag are meant to be a quick fight where eliminated players who win the standoff get a second chance to respawn with their team. Naturally, players are working on ways to better ensure victory, because they are clever little buggers. They've already figured out how to make the Gulag's "non-lethal" rocks deadly and learned to abuse the tagging system as well. I'm not laughing, this is very rude. It's definitely not quite funny.
]]>After dabbling with a battle royale mode in last year's Call Of Duty, Activision have finally caught up with 2017's hottest trend and today launched a free-to-play new battle royale. Call Of Duty: Warzone is its name, and shooting lots of people until one team stand triumphant is its game. I'd thought myself done with trying new battle royale games but the idea of one with the slickness of CoD is tempting me. Tired as it may be after years of annual sequels, CoD at its core does a whole lot right so I'm curious about this.
]]>After all the drama and hubub trying to keep things under wraps, Activision have announced a new Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare battle royale game today. It launches tomorrow and will be free to play even for those who haven't bought Modern Warfare. The 150-player matches will take you back to familiar locations all mashed up on one big map and puts a COD twist on a few battle royale features.
]]>Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare is probably getting a battle royale. At least, that's if you've been following the leaked photos, trailers, and unintentionally-revealed menu options that have been popping up lately. Naturally, Activision are a bit miffed over these leaks. The publisher has taken a scorched-earth approach to stamping out these rumours - slamming takedown notices against leaked shots and issuing a subpoena against Reddit to get to the bottom of Call Of Duty's worst-kept secret.
]]>New maps, new modes and new missions are what you lot have to expect when you log into Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare later, because Season Two drops today marking the return of a couple of Modern Warfare 2 fan-favourites. This season you'll be able to get some games in on the classic map, Rust, and if you buy the Battle Pass you'll be able to play as British spec-ops operator, Ghost (who I always thought looked more like a skeleton tbh but Ghost is a cool name too).
]]>You snooze you lose, Twitch. Activision Blizzard this week announced a multi-year deal with Google to stream future esports events solely through a plucky little website called YouTube. By nicking exclusive rights to broadcast big-hitters like the Overwatch and Call Of Duty Leagues, Hearthstone and such, Google hope to kick-start their struggling attempts to kickstart streaming on YouTube and topple Twitch's reign over the medium.
]]>Bungie, Infinity Ward and Ubisoft are joining the list of developers donating money to help combat the bushfires devastating Australia. It's been announced that Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare will be donating money from purchases of special "Outback Relief" packs, while Destiny 2 will get an exclusive t-shirt with profits going towards the country’s firefighting efforts and animal rescue and conservation.
Ubisoft Australia aren't creating incentives for players to donate however, instead they've simply donated $30,000 AUD (about £16,000) to the Australian Red Cross and Recovery Relief Fund.
]]>Captain Price, as played by former Hollyoaks serial killer Barry Sloane, is a figure of gruff warmth. He imbues the new Modern Warfare with the sozzled energy of an uncle on Boxing Day, eyes smiling even as bluster falls from his mouth. “We get dirty,” he mumbles, “and the world stays clean.” Nobody wants to ask if that means Uncle Baz has soiled himself.
Modern Warfare was marketed with that phrase: we get dirty, the world stays clean. But what does it mean, actually?
]]>Of course Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare has nothing interesting to say about war. Of course its guns feel good, and its explosions are many and impressive. Of course the multiplayer is essentially the same game we've been playing for over a decade, only prettier and in more flavours. Of course a part of me likes it, and of course part of me is jaded by its similarity to CODs prior. Of course, of course, of course.
'Of courses' are for horse critics with nothing interesting to say, however, and I'm not going to write a review filled with them. I just want to make it clear from the outset that Modern Warfare contains no surprises, outside of a few scenes where excess crosses the line into self-parody.
]]>There are two types of ray tracing games that have emerged over 2019. On the one hand you've got your big, bombastic feast-for-the-eyes type games like Minecraft RTX, Control and Metro Exodus, and on the other you've got your subtle, squint-and-you-miss-it jobs like Battlefield V and Shadow of the Tomb Raider. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare and its ray traced shadows fall squarely into the latter camp, although at least its campaign has the added benefit of taking place mostly at night so you can be doubly sure you don't miss them.
But what exactly does Modern Warfare's RTX support add to the game, and is it worth switching it on if it means taking a hit to your PC's performance? In my Modern Warfare RTX guide below, I'll take you through exactly what Call of Duty's ray tracing looks like, as well as what kind of performance you can expect to see across all of Nvidia's RTX graphics cards.
]]>HDR on PC hasn't improved much in 2019. Despite there being more HDR gaming monitors than ever before, the very best gaming monitors for HDR continue to be quite expensive compared to non-HDR monitors, and the situation around Windows 10 support for it is still a bit of a mess. However, provided you're willing to fight through all that, then the next step on your path to high dynamic range glory is to get an HDR compatible graphics card.
Below, you'll find a complete list of all the Nvidia and AMD graphics cards that have built-in support for HDR, as well as everything you need to know about getting one that also supports Nvidia and AMD's own HDR standards, G-Sync Ultimate and FreeSync 2. I've also put together a list of all the PC games that support HDR as well, so you know exactly which PC games you can start playing in high dynamic range.
]]>My dad’s favourite game series returned today. Call Of Duty 100% puts him back in his army days, and though I’m not sure I should be encouraging that sort of thing, it’s nice that we have a shared interest. And it makes me wonder if he did cool things with drones.
Despite being a resomethinging of the series, Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare looks very much the bombastic FPS button-masher that has clogged up the internet’s arteries for the past decade and a bit. Go all over the world, shoot people there, then pretend to be thoughtful about it. Infinity Ward's latest was released in the wee hours.
]]>It's taken a few years longer than most big publishers, but Activision are finally turning away from paid DLC map packs for the next Call Of Duty. New maps and modes will hit Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare free for all players, the CoD crew announced last night. Loot boxes are also being ripped out, replaced with the new hotness of a Battle Pass system with free and paid tracks. And they insist that "all functional content that has an impact on game balance" can be unlocked by playing. Sounds better, on paper.
]]>Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare's launch trailer hit today, and it's looking more like the old Modern Warfare than ever. We've already heard of how this year's CoD is a more "edgy, culturally relevant and thought-provoking" than more recent entries. In the past five years, CoD has been both an interstellar space adventure and a nonlinear cyber dreamscape, after all. But Call Of Duty will always be Call Of Duty, and Modern Warfare has its fair share of explosive spectacle to flaunt before our boots hit the ground on October 25th.
]]>Modern Warfare is almost upon us, again. This year's Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare is much more modern than those other Modern Warfares (all three of them) which, in hindsight, aren't quite so modern anymore. Things are gritty and real this time around, which is both much more modern and far more war than before. See? Open the Blizzard launcher and take a look for yourself. Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare's big cross-platform open beta kicks off this weekend. Assuming, of course, you're not fighting in it already.
]]>If you've yet to buy an Nvidia RTX graphics card, there's a new game bundle in town. Previously, Nvidia were giving away free copies of Control and Wolfenstein: Youngblood when you bought any qualifying RTX or RTX Super GPU, laptop or desktop, but starting today until November 18th they're going to be lobbing in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare with them instead. As you may remember, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare is yet another of this year's big blockbusters with confirmed ray tracing support. However, you also may remember from last month's big Gamescom trailer for it that they had to draw great big green boxes round the ray tracing bits because they were all so darn subtle.
]]>The new (and definitely not old) Call of Duty: Modern Warfare may be one of Nvidia's big-shot ray tracing games for 2019, but the first RTX trailer for Infinity Ward's upcoming shootybang is probably one of the least impressive things I've seen since Nvidia first announced their realistic reflection/shadow tech this time last year. Previously, most of Nvidia's RTX On / RTX Off trailers have shown a subtle, but discernible difference when they compare the base game to what it looks like with ray tracing switched on, but Modern Warfare's effort is so dang understated that Nvidia have had to draw great big green boxes round it to make sure you don't miss it.
]]>It's nearly time for more war. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare - a much more modern shootbang than 2007's Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare - is opening up a cross-platform beta from the 21st to the 23rd of September. Hurray, we get to shoot at console rubes. Boo, platform factionalism is weird and bad and it's hard to see that being a fair fight without auto-aim in the mix.
A multiplayer trailer awaits below.
]]>I'll admit that I'm almost impressed that Infinity Ward is showing restraint with the new Call of Duty: Modern Warfare. I figured that it would try and gobble up the ever-increasing player numbers that have been spurred on by the battle royale craze and announce the world's first 7.53 billion multiplayer mode, set on a 1:1 recreation of the Earth. But my cynicism was shown to be wrong last night when they let everyone see the new Gunfight mode, which is stripped so far back as to be almost naked. Call of Nudey, if you will. It's 2v2 and on tiny maps. We have some streamers screaming below.
]]>We hear a lot about level designers in games. Voice actors, concept artists, big directors. Kate Edwards is none of those things. She is a geographer. It seems like an odd job for the games industry, but the more you learn about her work, the more it feels essential. Edwards is hired by studios to cast her geo-eye over the shuffling NPCs of sci-fi space stations, to examine tiny markings in the giant buildings of first-person shooters, and inspect the maps of sprawling fantasy realms. She’s there to ask one thing: is this game being ignorant? The answer is often “yes”.
]]>Coming to us from Activision's ever-cycling stable of studios comes another Call Of Duty this October. Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare is a reimagining of this particular sub-series, rather than another remake or sequel, and not to be confused with Call Of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, or Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare Remastered. Original developers Infinity Ward are returning and threatening an "edgy, culturally relevant and thought-provoking single-player campaign". Seems they're going back to cinematic excess after Black Ops 4 went entirely multiplayer. Below, the debut trailer.
]]>After eons of hush-hush legal drama and remarkably silent tinkering, Respawn Entertainment finally revealed Titanfall during E3. Gone are the rah-rah-rah military men - neck veins like titanium from a lifetime of barking orders - replaced by futuristic commandos and the mechs who love them. Or at least nearly bro-fist them into their cockpits. There's some unintentional silliness involved, to be sure, but this one actually looks rather promising. It has agile, Hawken-esque mechs, fleet-footed infantry, a campaign that intriguingly fuses single-player and multiplayer, and - tornado hurricane sigh of relief - it's not a Windows 8 exclusive. But how exactly does all of that come together? And how far along could the game actually be given that it was caught in the crossfire of a legal battle between Respawn and Infinity Ward until not too long ago? I spoke with Respawn's Joel Emslie to find out.
]]>You'll probably have already picked up on the ongoing fallout from Tuesday's Activision-Infinity Ward oh-so-modern warfare, but as the talking point du jour we should probably cover it. The story so far: Infinity Ward heads Vince Zampella and Jason West didn't turn up to work after a meeting with the developer's owner Activision - but some hired muscle did. Shortly afterwards, Activision filed suit against the pair for "breaches of contract and insubordination", a charge that is yet to be explained. Since then, Zampella and West have filed right back at 'em, with accusations of withheld royalties and "Orwellian moves" to construct a case for their dismissal. Activision have duly refuted the claims, but it's increasingly looking like this stems from a tussle for control of the Call of Duty and Modern Warfare franchises. Oh, why can't more happy things happen in the videogame industry?
]]>Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare soldiers are reporting to families that they're massively under-supplied and being forced to use old equipment from Medal Of Honor games. In conversations leaked to Rock, Paper, Shotgun, it has become clear that forces based in Azerbaijan are struggling to stay ahead in the combat, with enemy soldiers far better equipped for the battles. Reports of extensive casualties coming from the warzones are being blamed by family members on these shortages, arguing that the government needs to send over more experience points immediately, along with all available perks. It was also said that the soldiers missed their mums, and they'd call them again later to see if they were back. RPS says: come on government - our boys need your support NOW.
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