The 10 Biggest Call of Duty Controversies And Scandals

10 Call of Duty Controversies & Scandals

Caitlin Johnson

Welcome to MojoPlays, and today we’re looking at the most controversial moments from “Call of Duty’s” history.

The Acquisition

In the end, it took over a year and a half and cost Microsoft a grand total of $75.4 billion, but Activision Blizzard King is now a first-party Xbox company. From the beginning, though, people were against this. Not just Sony, which had a lot to lose if it went ahead, but ordinary players who didn’t think a deal like this would actually be good for the games industry. We don’t yet know if that’s going to prove true, or if the addition of “Call of Duty” to Game Pass day 1 will actually move Xbox consoles when “Starfield” didn’t. “Call of Duty” itself made up most of Sony’s attempts to block the acquisition, with the argument that the franchise was so big that Microsoft making it an exclusive would be terrible for competition – though, it luckily hasn’t done that.

No Prestige

In the golden days of “Call of Duty”, the multiplayer progression was centered around the prestige system. After reaching the level cap, players could choose to prestige and go back to the beginning, but with shiny, new emblems and cosmetics to show off their accomplishment. To everybody’s disdain, Activision got rid of this with the “Modern Warfare” reboot in 2019. Instead, seasons were revamped so that each season, your levels reset, putting everyone back to zero every few months. Thankfully, this has changed with “Black Ops 6”, but for five years, we had “COD” games with no prestige, and it was always unpopular.

Apolitical

“Call of Duty” gets criticism from across the political spectrum for the ideas people think it promotes. On the one hand there are the terminally online individuals who think that any kind of diversity ruins their fun, and on the other are the people who think “COD” promotes the US military and glamorizes warfare. Well, according to Infinity Ward, everybody’s wrong, because “Call of Duty” doesn’t contain any politics whatsoever. That’s what the studio said when “Modern Warfare” came out to avoid getting too many difficult questions about its campaign. But it’s absurd to suggest that games about any kind of global conflict are apolitical; even trying to take a politically neutral stance is still taking a stance.

No Campaign in Black Ops 4

Perhaps the best way to avoid people debating the merits of your AAA game’s campaign is to get rid of it completely. That’s what Treyarch did with “Black Ops 4”, putting out a full-price “Call of Duty” title with NO single-player story mode. The main reason for this is apparently that the higher ups in Activision didn’t like the story Treyarch had put together and wanted the studio to focus on Blackout instead, and that there was, in the end, no time for a campaign. In fairness, “Black Ops 3” had an infamously bad story mode, but getting rid of single player entirely wasn’t a solution. Thankfully, no subsequent games have forgone the campaign.

Humvee Lawsuit

This one’s a little strange, but AM General once tried to take Activision to court over the use of Humvees in “Modern Warfare”. AM General’s suit, filed in 2017, said that the company had been harmed because Activision used its vehicles and their designs without a licence, and that this is trademark infringement. The ruling actually went in Activision’s favour, though, deciding in a court of law that games are art. After all, movies don’t need to licence the images of every single car they show on screen, so it doesn’t make sense that video games would. It was determined that the Humvees benefit “Call of Duty” by enhancing its realism.

Infinite Warfare

Has there ever been a more contentious “Call of Duty” game than “Infinite Warfare”? Well, maybe, and we’ll get to that soon, but “Infinite Warfare” was certainly the most maligned “COD” game ever made when it released. From its very first trailer, people hated the sci-fi elements as “COD” went to outer space. When the game came out it was nowhere near as bad as people feared, but that first trailer racked up millions of dislikes, breaking YouTube records. It’s also an often forgotten “Call of Duty” game now and definitely isn’t as beloved as some “Black Ops” or “Modern Warfare” entries.

Modern Warfare III

Worse than “Infinite Warfare” was 2023’s “Modern Warfare III”. The bombastic third entry in the “Modern Warfare” reboot, this game appeared despite Activision promising repeatedly that “Call of Duty” was going to skip a year. The higher ups couldn’t say no to all that free money, and free money it WAS, because “Modern Warfare III” was almost completely worthless. Featuring a forgettable campaign and NO new multiplayer maps at launch, the game served no purpose other than to line Bobby Kotick’s pockets and went down in history as one of gaming’s all-time most shameless cash grabs. It was the first “Modern Warfare” game led by Sledgehammer and not Infinity Ward, and definitely wasn’t a return to form for them after the previous failure of “Vanguard”.

Infinity Ward

Despite creating the “Call of Duty” franchise, Infinity Ward hasn’t been treated too kindly by its overlords at Activision over the years. In 2007, hot off the success of “Modern Warfare” – which remains one of the series’ best games – Activision decided to get rid of studio leads Jason West and Vince Zampella. They wanted creative control, and had it written into their contracts, with the catch that this would be lost if they were fired. And so, Activision made the workplace so unbearable that the duo was forced out and fired for insubordination. Thankfully, they continued to have success through Respawn, but this was an early taste of Activision’s mistreatment of its employees.

Frat House

In 2021, Activision Blizzard was sued by the state of California over workplace harassment and unequal pay, with female employees found to be being treated worse and paid less than the men in a, quote, “frat house” culture. This affected a lot of studios but the makers of “Call of Duty” were some of them, with none escaping California’s scrutiny. This dragged on for years until it was finally settled in 2023 for over $100 million in total when the fund for the victims is taken into account. This is a drop in the ocean compared to how much money Activision got through Microsoft’s acquisition, but it was a huge scandal. Subsequent years haven’t been kind to employees either, because Microsoft has laid of hundreds of Activision Blizzard staff.

No Russian

The gaming controversy to end all gaming controversies, in 2009 Infinity Ward made the choice to depict an attack on an airport in “Modern Warfare 2”. The mission, “No Russian”, was widely talked about ahead of release for its no-holds-barred approach to this part of modern life, but it was also criticized for a wide array of reasons. There were people who thought it was inappropriate for a video game to portray something like this at all; there were people who thought it was done badly; and there were people who loved the bold choice, but who thought that Infinity Ward neutered its effect by making it skippable. But whatever your take, it was a watershed moment for video games being taken seriously, and its legacy continues to this day.

Are you playing the latest “COD”? Let us know!