It’s a strange bout that highlights a few glaring errors within Infinity Ward‘s development process as a patch recently struck Callo of Duty: Modern Warfare days before the $3,000,000 is officially underway.
The most egregious part of the patch is that it fundamentally reworked how the MP5, a critical tool within the arsenal of the Call of Duty League (CDL), which was not noted in the patch notes; it was noted by players that banded together on Twitter to compare versions of MP5 between pre and post-patch.
When the patch was announced, prior to its release, a few prominent members of the CDL community questioned the wisdom guiding a patch so close to the Championship; a staff member for Infinity Ward stated that they were not going to touch the weapons that were used by professional players within CDL. The patch then affected a primary weapon used heavily in CDL and competitive game modes.
The frustration from the community regarding the changes, and also that they were not included in the patch notes, leading many to believe that the changes were not supposed to be readily noticed.
It was alleged that Infinity Ward was asking CDL teams, once the change was noted, if they wanted to revert the patch played for the championship series back that would bring the MP5 back into use. It appears that the movement did not pass; the CDL Championship will be played with the altered weapon.
The change to the MP5 affected both spray pattern and ADS view, meaning that players will either need to adapt to the new changes of the weapon or find a new weapon entirely.
This is a massive shakeup to CDL that has more than a few members of the community calling for more integrity in the matchups.
Concerns regarding the integrity of CDL Championship seem well-founded at this point: a sudden and dramatic shift for a staple weapon within the scene after a full season will likely shake up the results for the final. Whether this was Infinity Ward’s plan, to offer lesser teams a ‘sporting chance’ at the finals by altering one of the primary weapons, is not clear.
Many have opted to simply not ‘waste their time’ arguing against the changes that Infinity Ward has pushed out, instead setting their sights on the next upcoming Call of Duty title, Cold War, which has already managed to generate controversy prior to release.
Infinity Ward has not made an official announcement regarding the controversial change; we have attempted to reach out to them for comment regarding the situation.