The iconic Predator has come back and is now in the gaming universe where he is in Call of Duty Warzone and Black Ops 6 as a player hunter. PlayStation has introduced a new event where the supposedly horrific alien creature is occupying the battle royale area, and just like the modern gaming collaboration, the gamers are welcome to join the fun by being the prey.
What Call of Duty players can anticipate from this recent update is the primary question? PlayStation, in an official statement, said that the Predator is “up for a challenge” in Warzone and Black Ops 6. Along with the announcement came a fantastic artwork demonstrating Predator’s distinctive silhouette against a dark and eerie backdrop, recognizably featuring those dreadful jaws and thermal vision effects that the franchise’s fans would instantly associate.
But at this point, the situation became unexpected; while PlayStation was absorbed in promoting this new crossover as new content, the company was reportedly experiencing such a major crisis with its servers that it was a full-blown situation. Numerous players grumbled that the PSN had been down for a long time and one even mentioned that he had been suffering from the issues “since 10 pm yesterday EST” and still could not connect. Going to say not great timing.
The Call of Duty community’s response can be characterized as… mixed at the very least. The return of the Predator was received by some players with exhilaration, while others expressed their disappointment through comments such as “Time to hunt! Who’s joining?” and “Ominous skies and shadows, the hunt is on!” which were highly suggestive of the gamers’ excitement for the crossover event. One player even said it was “awesome news” about Black Ops 6, while another claimed he/she was “ready to take on the challenge.”
In contrast, the negative feedback was very loud and plentiful. A big group of players expressed their dissatisfaction regarding this as they felt it was the same old trap of Call of Duty developers. One user complained that the new design of skins and effects was just the “same old engine” and asked when the franchise would ever upgrade its technology. Another person simply said “COD needs to die,” while multiple comments gave the impression that gamers were migrating to Xbox instead.
The server problems seemed to be the last straw for many users who were already disgruntled with the game’s current course. Many of the comments were similar to “Fix your servers now,” and “PSN Servers have been down since 10pm EST yesterday” with one user saying he had “no idea you guys had issues since yesterday” when he finally got the problem himself.
There were even some people who were not sure whether or not the server trouble was restricted only to affected users because one person asked if “Wait it’s only affecting atnt users?” to another who was having trouble connecting. The timing could not have been worse for PlayStation—they were announcing new content while their network was reportedly struggling to provide even basic connectivity.
The backlash was not solely about the servers, however. Many were the comments urging the developers to reconsider what they thought might be excessive monetization and crossover content, a couple of comments such as “You are not Fortnite! Cut the crap!” referring to the Predator bundle and being one of the more forceful ones were quite common. Another one just said “Can’t believe ya’ll promoting this BS,” while one particularly exasperated user claimed he would “rather take a bath with my toaster” than deal with the new content.
Still, the negative sentiment prevailed over the positive vibe of the players who were waiting for the Predator’s arrival. One player jokingly mentioned he would “keep an eye out for that sneaky predator” and maybe even give the creature “the shock of its life” during their encounters. The official Call of Duty Events account even conveyed a “Happy Haunting” message, which was quite appropriate for the spooky seasonal announcement.
The divide in the community is indicative of broader issues among the player bases of Call of Duty; those who enjoy the frequent crossover events and cosmetic updates versus those who feel the franchise is not true to its origins. Such comments as “DOA” (dead on arrival) together with player loss statistics suggest that the series has been losing its audience and thus not all are content with its current direction.
One particularly intriguing aspect of this whole situation is how it reflects the ongoing rivalry among the gaming platforms. A user highlighted the inconsistency by stating that PlayStation was “selling bundles in a game owned by Microsoft,” which created a situation due to the Microsoft acquisition of Activision Blizzard. This is a factor that makes the relationships between platform holders and third-party game content very complicated in the current gaming scenario.
Gamers are still arguing about the pros and cons of crossover content versus core gameplay improvements, and some users are still experiencing connectivity problems, but the Predator is still roaming the Warzone. It is not clear yet whether this latest addition of a character will be a factor in bringing back more players to the game or in driving them into the arms of competitors, but one thing is for certain—the reaction was not unanimous. The gaming community is still very much split in their wishes for the Call of Duty franchise, and this incident only served to underscore the differences between the factions significantly.
Maybe the real predator is not the alien hunter in the video game but rather the fight over the market share of one of the most successful game franchises. Or perhaps I am just reading too much into this and people just want to shoot aliens while waiting for Black Ops 6. In any case, the hunt is on regardless of whether players want it or not.
