For several weeks, Warzone 2.0 and DMZ players have found themselves struggling under the weight of persistent server issues. It has become an all-too-common occurrence to have games entirely ruined by lagging and ‘rubber-banding’, but for the most part, it seemed as though Activision – and associated studios – didn’t care about fixing the underlying problem. That is, until now – apparently, Activision’s teams have identified the root cause and are nearing a fix, but the server issues are still ongoing.
Those that have been playing Warzone 2.0 since the moment it launched in November 2022 will be aware of the fact that these issues are long-standing. They didn’t spring up overnight, but they’ve been lurking in the darkness for the entire six-month period that has gone by. While there’s a recent update that discusses mitigation and actively updating the game to prevent these server issues, it seems as though nothing that’s being done is truly fixing the game’s servers.
We Just Want To Play
Image Credit: Activision
It’s a tough thing to try and enjoy a multiplayer-based game while suffering from lag, rubber-banding, disconnects, and desynchronisation. That’s what’s happening to players attempting to enjoy Warzone 2.0 – but it gets worse. The World Series of Warzone, the pinnacle of Warzone’s esports scene, is due to commence soon, following a delay, but competitors are worried that they’ll not be able to rack up points effectively while dealing with buggy servers.
Activision does insist that work is being done, though:
We are aware of a recent uptick in server-related issue reports. Investigations uncovered a network buffer memory issue that we have since addressed. Our teams are actively engaged in mitigation of further issues. We are committed to continued progress and will update as we are… https://t.co/TNOa8ek9Kc
— Call of Duty (@CallofDuty) May 9, 2023
For anyone in a technological world, it seems bizarre that it would take so long to identify a simple network buffer memory issue. It has taken Activision’s teams several weeks to determine that this is the root cause of the server instability, but in all honesty, it’s the kind of thing that would really be made noticeable by proactive network monitoring. It would flare up an alert as soon as it became an issue, in an ideal world.
So, either Activision’s teams lack effective monitoring, which would be ridiculous considering its profile, or it simply didn’t care enough to fix the root cause.
On April 20th, the firm stated that it was looking into server-related gameplay issues, and more than two weeks later, on May 9th, it was claimed that these issues were now fixed.
All Time Low
As time goes on, the overall player count and viewership figures for Warzone 2.0 are dropping. Recently, Warzone viewer numbers on Twitch dropped to an all-time low, showing a distinct lack of interest in the game. This is apparently because it’s so much ‘slower’ than the first Warzone game that was released in March 2020. There’s nothing exciting about Warzone 2.0, which is an unfortunate fact, considering how immensely popular the first game was.
Sadly, even the best Call of Duty players in the world are trying to jump off the Warzone 2.0 platform in favour of something else. Recently, XDefiant stood tall in the media, but other battle royale games like Apex Legends, Fortnite, and PUBG are still seeing huge numbers and ongoing success in the midst of Warzone 2.0’s downfall.