Modern Warfare 3 just hit rock bottom, as an update completely broke Warzone and then the much-anticipated start of Ranked Play was delayed shortly after.
January 17, 2024, might go down as one of the worst days in the history of the Call of Duty franchise. The rollout of the much anticipated Season 1 Reloaded update was an absolute disaster. It completely broke Warzone and the launch of Ranked Play in MP had to be delayed as well.
Modern Warfare 3 Ranked Play Delayed & Warzone Completely Broken After Update
The delay of MW3 Ranked Play was revealed via the @CODUpdates Twitter channel. “Due to unforeseen circumstances”, the announcement reads, “MWIII Ranked Play will be delayed while we investigate a recently discovered critical issue”. Ranked Play is supposed to launch “as soon as possible” while the developers are working to fix this issue.
What this critical issue is remains unclear. But it will surely be just one of a number of problems caused by the Season 1 Reloaded update, which also left Warzone in a state of basically being unplayable. Shortly after the mid-season update was rolled out, social media was flooded with clips and posts about the countless bugs and issues that were introduced with this update.
Today's update has broken Warzone completely.
— CharlieIntel (@charlieINTEL) January 17, 2024
Yikes. pic.twitter.com/CWsnHTQpKE
A lot of Warzone's problems seem to stem from the new Champion’s Quest feature, which developer Raven Software has already disabled. In an announcement on Twitter/X, they apologize for the state of the update and promise quick improvements:
“At the moment, the current state of the update does not meet our standards for quality and gameplay, and we are committed to addressing the issues promptly to ensure that all players can enjoy Warzone to the fullest extent possible. Our goal is always to provide a smooth and seamless experience. With that said, we'll be reenabling Champion’s Quest at the earliest possible opportunity. We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience this may cause to those who already began chasing those victories!”
As you can imagine, this whole disaster did not go down particularly well with the fan base. Under the apology Tweets, you can find tons of comments like this one by user @ItwasLuck_: “This is really embarrassing for a multi-Billion dollar company. You guys aren't some start-up gaming studio like get it together.”
This terrible launch definitely mired the reputation of Call of Duty, Sledgehammer Games, and Raven Software. It remains to be seen, how quickly these issues can be fixed and how well fans will be appeased.