Esport and Call of Duty: Warzone – the two terms could hardly be further apart in June 2021. Activision has no interest in promoting the community despite the newly created World Series of Warzone.
“Some of the biggest names in Call of Duty: Warzone are competing for the biggest prize pool – that’s the World Series of Warzone,” Activision wrote in its official announcement on 19 May. What at first sounds like a gigantic esports push is nothing more than a big PR event in the background, where it’s all about sporting success only on paper.
You can’t get in here
The possibilities of qualifying for the tournament series as an ordinary player are slim and unfair. Because so far only the winning team of a qualifier gets a place in the big tournament. In the end, the big content creators and professional players of the American Call of Duty League call the shots.
Dropping in to the World Series of #Warzone 🪂
The biggest names in Warzone bring their skills to Verdansk for a massive, can't miss $300,000 event.
Catch the first tournament on June 23rd ➡ https://t.co/JsTDXej1Hu pic.twitter.com/SlMzJGJmhs
— Call of Duty (@CallofDuty) May 19, 2021
It’s like a posh club hosting the best events, but you get intercepted by the bouncer outside despite being best dressed and then watch the party on screen. Being in the middle of it, instead of just being there, unfortunately looks different. Two years ago, the Fortnite World Cup was constantly in the headlines because every buffoon had an equal chance and could try to qualify for the final round in New York and get something out of the $30 million prize money.
In the World Series of Warzone, on the other hand, over 90 per cent of the players are made up of pre-determined professionals, streamers, influencers and Activision partners. Sporting looks different. There are no underdogs, no heroes from nowhere. Activision wants to have an artificially set up event – no community support. That is a school mark of 5 and thus poor for the so-called esport ambitions. In total, the prize money of all four tournaments together amounts to 1.2 million US dollars, 300,000 USD per event. And unfortunately, most of that is for the already big fish in the CoD pond.
Cheating problems and lots of control
Warzone has been struggling with significant cheating for many months. And this problem is getting in the way of an event where every ordinary player in the world can qualify. Over 500,000 cheating accounts have already been banned by Activision and Raven Software. But there’s no end in sight as cheaters come back with creative solutions and a bunch of accounts.
In Fortnite, we saw in the World Cup qualifiers how serious cheating can be when the prize money is high. A wave of bans came in that took out over 1,000 cheaters. Two players Xxif and Ronaldo even made it to the big stage despite cheating, which gave Epic Games a huge shitstorm. After all, both had received 50,000 US dollars each to compete in the final round, denying other players the opportunity.
Activision wants nothing to do with such problems. Well aware of the considerable cheating problems in Warzone, the number of unknown participants is to be kept as low as possible. After all, the developer can then still say: Everyone had their chance. And the control for the few qualified players is then kept within limits anyway.
Activision would rather save the money and the effort instead of putting it into a functioning anticheat. Then rather fire out the next scripted event for millions. The main thing is that in the end the streamers and professionals get their share of the cake and presumably also pocket a large part of the prize money. Because there won’t be many “normal” players who fought their way through the Open Qualifiers.
Party with streamers and without the core community
In addition, the Open Qualifiers will become a kind of gamble anyway. Honest players will still have to deal with the numerous cheaters. If the cheaters end up on top, they will be sorted out directly before the final round due to Activision’s strict control. Will the time-placed teams then follow suit? It would not be unrealistic if the top 10 of a qualifier consisted of cheaters. Activision would hardly want to go to that trouble.
It would be better to rely on the pros of the Call of Duty League, who are already bound by contract, and to slip the big streamers even more money through the back door. Unfortunately, from an economic point of view, this move makes the most sense. The generated view numbers via the well-known pros as well as content creators like “NICKMERCS”, 100 Thieves CEO “Nadeshot” and many more is the attention Activision wants on Twitch, Youtube and co. But the actual core community, the passionate gamers, get very little out of the event. In the end, all that remains is a bit of entertainment on the screen – but at the party, others are celebrating.
