Sledgehammer Addresses Concerns with CoD: WWII Private Beta Performance

The CoD : WWII Private Beta started a few days ago but the reviews haven’t been glowing. Everything from load times, starting shotgun, post-match, voice-over intensity, partially full squads, and especially the new Divisions mechanic are taking flak on message boards.

Of course a Beta is not representative of the final product, but some elements (voice-over) are most likely set in stone at this point. Fortunately, COD : WWII doesn’t release until Nov 3, and I’m sure Activision will have Sledgehammer working feverishly on a big fat day-one patch right until the last possible second.

Time-to-kill

A noted issue is the time it takes a player to shoot after sprinting, which many have criticized as too long, discouraging aggressive play and rewarding camping.

TTK (the amount of time-to-kill from pulling the trigger) is reportedly inconsistent. This is obviously a worrying issue for competitive play but could simply be from server lag, which is what a Private Beta is designed to suss out.

Maps are also frequently cited as being too small, failing to replicate the epic scope of WW II warfare. Personally, I wish the UI was more in line with the era, rather than looking like a re-skinned Modern Warfare.

Sledgehammer addressed many concerns on Aug 24, with an update released today.

• We love the positive reactions to the new overhead camera eSports feature. In response to feedback about visibility of objectives, especially Hardpoints, we are currently working on solutions for launch.
• Some players are reporting getting trapped in an update loop after they are prompted to restart their game to complete an update of the client. We have been resolving these through basic troubleshooting and are investigating further steps.
• You have asked about a color blind setting in the menu. While not in the Beta, we have been working to have this for launch.
• In response to all the requests for bumper jumper configuration, we also plan to support this for launch.
• We’ve heard your feedback regarding playlist variety, and have made some adjustments to improve this. You know what else would improve it? More maps and modes.
• We’ve heard your feedback on the Paratroopers Scorestreak having some edge case issues. We made some adjustments today, but they didn’t address the core issue in the way we wanted. We’ve got new fixes coming soon.
• We are investigating a bug that causes some players to be kicked back to the Main Menu after accepting an invite from the load screen of any map.
• There is a bug causing the title to crash when an invitee accepts an invite while entering a match when the inviter is also entering the match.
• Some of you have noted that the incendiary shells feel too strong. We’re looking into data to determine if a nerf is needed.
• Improvements to Party UI / UX are underway. Implementation date is still TBD, but know that we are actively working on it.”

This console generation has seen many ‘betas’ started far too close to release date to affect any real change, amounting to more of a publicized demo. Sledghammer still has over two months to tidy up server issues before the real test begins for Cod November 3rd.