A bizarre Modern Warfare 2 Beta glitch is accidentally sending players to a Warzone 2 menu screen, leading to early speculation that the two titles may be bundled into the same launcher once again.
When Warzone first arrived in March 2020, it did so as part of the Modern Warfare package. While it served as an independent Battle Royale experience, players had to launch Infinity Ward’s 2019 title in order to access the new component.
Through all the following seasons, major content drops, and even pivots to all new titles with Warzone’s Pacific era in the Vanguard cycle, the games have remained linked. To this day, Warzone appears as the Modern Warfare application on various hardware.
Given its limitations and unprecedented file size, many have hoped that Warzone 2 will release as a standalone title. However, with the Modern Warfare 2 Beta now live, and a new bug sending players to a Warzone 2 menu, some are beginning to worry that won’t be the case.
While playing in the first week of the Modern Warfare 2 Beta on PlayStation, Reddit user ‘Sybrun’ noticed something out of the ordinary. Rather than seeing the typical multiplayer modes in the bottom left corner, along with their single Operator in the background, their menu was completely different.
Seven characters spread across the screen as ‘Warzone Private Match’ appeared in a new text overlay. For the most part, everything else atop the screen remained in place. Weapons, Operators, Challenges, and the Store all still appeared, as did the new social tab and settings menu.
Clearly a mistake, the player was unable to launch into a private match on the new Al Mazrah map. Though others who encountered the issue were allegedly able to scroll down and view playlists for Warzone Trios, Plunder, and a mysterious ‘Alternate Mode.’
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Given this bug occurred in the Beta, on a launcher specifically designed for Modern Warfare 2, some took this as an indication of what’s to come at launch.
“Not good,” one player said on Reddit. “The two games should be completely separate clients.”
In recent years, we’ve seen the original Modern Warfare application run into issues due to its ever-expanding file size. Whether Warzone 2 repeats the same by jumping in with Modern Warfare 2 remains to be seen.
For the time being, it’s obviously worth keeping in mind this is purely a Beta. The Warzone private match screen could just be appearing due to a completely innocuous error, not one that points to a merge with both upcoming titles.
We’ll have to wait and see how it all pans out when Modern Warfare 2 launches on October 28 and Warzone 2 arrives shortly after on November 16.