Warzone 2.0 is giving Call Of Duty players preload issues again
The battle royale goes live tomorrow
Warzone 2 drops tomorrow, November 16th, bringing a DMZ extraction mode, Al Mazrah map, and an all-new map-based battle pass. Some Call Of Duty players looking forward to getting their itchy trigger fingers on the free-to-play battle royale have been struggling to sort out their preloads, though. This confusion echoes what happened with Modern Warfare 2019 when Warzone 1.0 launched back in 2020. If you’re bemused by the current preload sitch then watch the Warzone 2.0 launch trailer below, and let Freebird chill you out.
The CODfusion seems to come from there being two sets of Call Of Duty players: people who own Modern Warfare 2, and people who don’t. Both can preload Warzone 2.0, but doing that requires a few different steps. Modern Warfare 2 owners technically already have Warzone 2.0 installed, which is the confusing part, and just need to queue a Season 1 update in their launcher of choice ahead of Warzone 2.0 going live.
If you don’t own Modern Warfare 2 then there are separate store pages for Warzone 2.0 on Steam and Battle.net that let you preload the game right now. You’ll still need to grab that Season 1 update ahead of launch, however.
Activision have already issued a PSA about all the various preload shenanigans, which you can read here. It didn’t help that the Call Of Duty publisher announced a temporary delay for the Season 1 update when preloads were due to begin yesterday:
#ModernWarfare2 Season 01 will also be launching November 16 at 10 AM PT. Download of the content update is temporarily delayed and will be available soon. Standby for updates.
— Call of Duty (@CallofDuty) November 14, 2022
Not to sound big headed, but I didn’t experience much faff with preloading Warzone 2.0. I already own Modern Warfare 2 on Battle.net, which began the preload as an update as soon as I signed in. I’ve tried it on my desktop and laptop, and the download worked fine both times. You can check out Rebecca’s handy guide to Warzone 2.0’s preload times and release time for more info.
Call Of Duty: Warzone 2.0 is free to play and goes live tomorrow, November 16th on Steam and Battle.net. Stay frosty, because we’ll be bringing you more coverage once the battle begins.
Activision Blizzard are currently the subject of a number of legal actions, labour disputes and allegations of workplace harassment. Rock Paper Shotgun will continue to write about these issues, as well as covering Activision Blizzard games as part of our commitment to cover subjects of interest to our readers. The latest news can always be found under our Activision Blizzard tag.
