Following the recent addition of new operator bundles that the Call of Duty: Warzone community has called pay to win, Infinity Ward has made a couple of changes to them to alleviate concerns. It's been a tough week or so for Call of Duty which saw the arrival of Season 3, bringing the conflict between Alejandro and his rival, Valeria. However, alongside all of the new content in Season 3, controversy seems to also be a major component as fans have taken issue with more than a few things recently added.
As a live-service game, Call of Duty: Warzone 2 continues to push new content in the form of bundles, which are largely cosmetic in nature. Unfortunately, a few recent in-game store items have seemingly crossed that line for many players as new bundles appear to come with special perks which many in the community are calling pay to win. Some of the new Warzone and DMZ microtransactions like the Bomb Squad Operator bundle come with character and weapon skins that comes with perks like starting matches with a medium backpack, UAV, armor vests, and more. Naturally, these discoveries led to a lot of backlash, and that feedback seems to have prompted some changes following the most recent game update.
Patch notes for the April 19 update for Call of Duty: Warzone 2 included a very specific DMZ update, targeting the controversial Thorns Out Roze operator skin which gets a free UAV at the start of the match. Following the update, all players now have a one-minute cooldown at the start of a DMZ match before any UAV killstreaks can be used. While it appears that Infinity Ward intended for this to be a good compromise, it has left the coimmunity feeling even more frustrated that the pay to win bundles were not removed or at least more significantly changed.
Over on the Call of Duty:Warzone subReddit, a user named Vikan12 remained frustrated that Infinity Ward is attempting to balance P2W mechanics in a modern, non-mobile AAA game. Many comments in the thread echoed this sentiment and some have indicated that most DMZ players wouldn't use their UAV right away anyway, attempting to first get to a better position or a nearby point of interest before using it.
The pay to win bundles are just one piece to the overall Season 3 community frustration. Another piece of DLC that have left fans feeling upset is with a bundle that fans can pay to unlock classic Modern Warfare 2 sounds, essentially feeding off player nostalgia. For many though, the newly announced Blackcell Battle Pass in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 has drawn the most criticism as it can't be purchased with CoD Points and instead forces players to use ral money. On top of that, it offers exclusive bonuses and benefits outside of the traditional systems in place.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 is available now on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
