Season 5 brought some new features to Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 and Warzone. Among them were dogs, the new battle pets. Unfortunately, companions come with benefits when you buy and use them.
Over the past few years, Call of Duty has consistently introduced new types of cosmetics. A few experiments were really wrong, like the skins for killcams in CoD: Vanguard.
But now we’re at a point where some players might want the crazy experiments back. Because Call of Duty is currently bringing more and more Pay2Win mechanics into play, each time via cosmetics, for which you would have to put a lot of money on the table.
The latest trick: battle pets. These are animals that accompany you invisibly and only appear if you have selected and used the correct finisher move. There was something like that before, even with birds or wolves. What is new, however, is that the animals can give certain advantages.
You can watch the trailer for the current Season 5 of Call of Duty here:
CoD MW2 & Warzone: Season 5 – Trailer shows the return of the Shadow Company
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Why is the dog Pay2Win? The dog is called Merlin and changes a powerful perk that helps find opponents: “Alert”.
As soon as an opponent looks at you from a direction that you are not currently facing, you will get a visual signal on your screen. You can be sure there is an enemy somewhere in the direction of the signal.
With Merlin you also get an acoustic signal: the dog growls. A video on Reddit shows that this little thing can be an advantage:
Only when the dog growls does one of the opponents take a closer look around the room and discover the thread creator in his hiding place. The filing cabinet tactic didn’t work. Incidentally, opponents can also hear the growl – perhaps an attempt by the developers to reduce the advantage a bit.
Is it really that bad? Worse. The howling dog Merlin continues a trend that is pushing Call of Duty further and further towards Pay2Win.
It’s just little things at the moment, homeopathic doses. There are skins that only bring advantages in DMZ mode. With the Doggo, a Pay2Win feature came into play for the first time, which works in Warzone, CoD MW2 and DMZ.
The dog is also part of the controversial but hugely popular Black Cell pack. Each season there is a new pack that also comes with tier skips for the Battle Pass. At €29.99, it’s one of the most expensive skin bundles ever.
What are the reactions? There’s a lot of arguing in this thread. There are players who defend the feature and don’t see Pay2Win here. The other faction is strictly against cosmetics that influence gameplay and change features.
how do you see it? Write us a comment on the topic.
Many comments also address the gameplay of the thread creator, who lurks in the corner with his Riot Shield. Such players do not have the best reputation either.