Warzone to join Call of Duty League confirms Activision Blizzard
Activision Blizzard’s Johanna Faries has revealed there are plans to add Warzone to the Call of Duty League.
Call of Duty’s battle royale has been an instant hit since its launch in early 2020, so it’s no surprise that an esports scene has blossomed from the popularity. Unlike the official Call of Duty League, these events have been hosted by third parties, and often take the form of kill-races.
In these events, teams competing don’t actually battle each other on the same map. Instead, two duos drop into a quads game, and whichever team gets the most kills wins, or the top five matches over a three hour period count towards a final score.
It’s highly entertaining to watch, but the competitive integrity of these tournaments has been questioned. With players apparently abusing the skill-based matchmaking algorithm, as well as the possibility of cheaters and stream-snipers being in the lobby, they can never be absolutely fair.
With the success of these third-party tournaments, it seems that Activison have serious plans to bring these events under the Call of Duty League banner, according to an interview with the company’s Head of Leagues Johanna Faries from ScreenRant.
Warzone coming to Call of Duty League
In the interview, Faries said: “There are [plans to bring Warzone to Call of Duty League], and we’re excited to announce those plans in the coming weeks and months. We’ve been closely monitoring the introduction and the wild popularity of Warzone since last spring.”
She continued: “We did bring in Warzone-related content with our pros last season, but we’ve taken the off-season to think bigger about what a more structured investment could look like. There are really exciting things to come as early as this season.”
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Here, Fairies refers to the CDL Warzone Weekends which took place during the 2020 season. CDL pros and coaches all fought each other in Verdansk to find out who the best battle royale players are.
CDL teams have hosted Warzone kill race tournaments in the past, but it’s clear that Activision wants to vastly expand how competitive CoD battle royale is run.
We’re not sure what these official tournaments will look like, but it’s very likely that they will have a system similar to Fortnite or Apex Legends, where all competitors must fight each other. And who doesn’t want to see the world’s best players 1v1 in the Gulag?
After joining the CDL as the LA Thieves, Nadeshot’s 100 Thieves are already gearing themselves towards this, adding CoD veterans Tommey and Rated to their competitive Warzone team.
With Activision now officially taking an interest in battle royale tournaments, we can hope that they will further address the number of cheaters that plague both casual and competitive Warzone.
And with Black Ops Cold War getting League Play during Season 1, perhaps a ranked Warzone mode will be coming along with this announcement.
Image Credits: Activision