After a short delay, Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War Season 1 has been released to the masses, integrating the latest game in the long-running Call of Duty series with the Warzone battle royale. The update is huge, adding a ton of content to both the Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War multiplayer and Zombies experiences, as well as making some significant changes to Warzone as well.
Treyarch has released some big Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War Season 1 patch notes to go along with the update, detailing many of the important changes that fans can expect to see once they download it. This includes information on some of the new Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War multiplayer maps and game modes, like the highly-anticipated return of the popular 2v2 Gunfight game mode. It also mentions some weapon balance changes and other tweaks that were made to both games.
On the Call of Duty: Warzone side of things, the Season 1 patch notes mainly highlight the new experiences that have been added. This includes the brand new Call of Duty: Warzone map Rebirth Island, which is the game's first new map since its launch last March. It also highlights the new Gulag experiences that players can find on both the Verdansk map as well as Rebirth Island, in addition to some of the Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War weapons that are now available in Warzone.
However, not all of the changes were mentioned in the patch notes. As usual, there were some secret changes made to both Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War and Call of Duty: Warzone with the Season 1 update, for whatever reason.
Rebirth Island Easter Egg
Call of Duty games, especially those developed by Black Ops series developer Treyarch, are famous for their easter eggs, and Warzone Season 1 is no different. The Rebirth Island map sees the addition of a new easter egg that players can complete in exchange for an exclusive reward, with no mention of this easter egg in the patch notes.
To complete the Call of Duty: Warzone Rebirth Island Easter Egg, players first have to find a briefcase that spawns in one of eight random locations on the battle royale map. After finding the briefcase, players will then be shown three photos of different locations around Rebirth Island. This is also randomized, so players will need to have pretty good knowledge of the Rebirth Island map and its locations if they want to successfully complete this easter egg before the match is over.
The briefcase photos will lead Call of Duty: Warzone Rebirth Island players to three different parts of a code. Once they have the complete code, Call of Duty: Warzone players can go to the Headquarters Command Center on the Rebirth Island map (assuming it's not already shrouded in poison gas) and enter the code on the keypad next to the yellow door. Inside the yellow door is the special SMG blueprint called the Red Room SMG, a reference to Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War's codename when it was in development and how its leaked alpha appeared on some digital marketplaces prior to its reveal.
Split-Screen
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War technically had split-screen since launch, but using the feature was unnecessarily cumbersome, and some Xbox Series X players reported being unable to access split-screen at all. Now Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War has much easier to use split-screen features across the board, with a message added to the main menu telling players they can switch split-screen on with a simple press of a button.
The tweak to make split-screen more easily accessible through the main menu was not mentioned in the Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War Season 1 patch notes, but one split-screen change was highlighted by Treyarch. As of the latest update, Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War Zombies supports split-screen. Why this important feature was left out of the game at launch has not been revealed, but many Zombies enthusiasts will be happy to see it return.
Theater Mode
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War launched with Theater Mode, which has proven to be a popular tool among those in the Call of Duty community. However, after downloading the Season 1 update, some Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War players may have a bit more difficulty finding Theater Mode. As it so happens, the update has moved Theater Mode's location, so players have to go elsewhere to find it.
To find Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War's Theater Mode after the Season 1 update, players will need to go to the Barracks section of the menu. It will be located at the bottom of the list of options, right underneath Achievements. No one has provided an explanation as to why Theater Mode was moved around as it wasn't mentioned in the Black Ops Cold War Season 1 patch notes, but now players should still be able to access it with minimal effort.
Verdansk Airport Bunker
While many Call of Duty: Warzone fans have been focused on the new map, Rebirth Island, the Verdansk battle royale map got some live at the start of Season 1 as well. Now that Call of Duty: Warzone is integrated with Black Ops Cold War, many of Black Ops' weapons have been added to the battle royale. In fact, players are able to swap between loadouts of the two games, so they can put one together based on Call of Duty: Modern Warfare's arsenal, another based on Black Ops Cold War's weapons.
It seems the bulk of changes made to Call of Duty: Warzone's Verdansk are noted in the patch notes, but there is one big one that fans have had to discover for themselves. After downloading the Call of Duty: Warzone Season 1 update and visiting the Verdansk airport, players will notice a large hole in the runway. If they drop into the hole, they will find themselves inside yet another one of Call of Duty: Warzone's bunkers. This one doesn't require a keycard for entry, but is still typically filled with fairly high-tier loot for players to collect.
Right now the Verdansk airport bunker is a high-traffic area, as players are dropping there not just for the easy loot, but to see what it's all about. Considering this, players may want to exercise caution before making it a destination until things cool down a bit.
XP Stealth Nerf
Now, this latest secret change may or may not be accurate, but according to reports from the community, Treyarch may have nerfed Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War's XP with the Season 1 update. This was not mentioned in the patch notes and has not been confirmed in an official capacity, so it's possible that players are misremembering how quickly they were earning XP previously, though that seems doubtful.
According to some members of the Call of Duty community, XP in Black Ops Cold War has pretty much been nerfed across the board. This would include XP that players get to level up their personal rank, as well as other things in the game. Not only that, but the amount of XP players were getting from playing Zombies also seems to be nerfed. It's possible that this was done because Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War recently introduced its first Battle Pass to coincide with Season 1, but that's just speculation at this time.
It's possible that there are even more secret changes in Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War and Warzone Season 1 after the update, but they have yet to be discovered by the community. If anymore secret changes crop up, we will update this article to make note of them.
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War is out now for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
