Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III’s campaign has already been available in early access for a few days, but the game arrives in full tomorrow, and a launch patch is being rolled out for the game. The update promises stability and performance improvements for the CoD: MWIII campaign (which isn’t getting great reviews so far) and to fix issues with being able to play offline. You can also expect a variety of UI improvements, tweaks to various maps, and some control changes, including the ability to double-tap a button to go into Tac-Stance.
Here's a rundown of some of the major new features and changes included in the CoD: Modern Warfare III launch update…
Campaign Stability & Performance
- Offline play will no longer be prevented after first setting up an Activision account.
- Save data integrity has been reviewed and checkpoint loading errors have been solved.
- Fixed multiple UI-related crashes that occurred while navigating menus.
- Resolved several crash bugs when loading into some missions.
- Fixed an issue in which some players experienced an excessive load time after the opening title splash.
- Fixed several graphical bugs that resulted in hitching after a melee kill.
- Fixed a graphical bug that resulted in assets loading in low quality.
Multiplayer UIX
Visual Changes
- Added a stroke to player nameplates to improve visibility.
- Adjusted font and contrast of the score event text on the HUD to be less obstructive.
New Features
- Added a HUD element that displays the player’s current streak after each kill.
- Match event popups now feature the respective player’s equipped Calling Card.
- Skillful player achievements, such as Kingslayer, Collateral, etc., will now display a Medal splash on the player’s HUD.
- Tac-Stance toggle state is now indicated by a widget in the lower-right area of the HUD, replacing the previous prompt while aiming down sights.
- Match Stats are now available during gameplay via a new tab in the Scoreboard, allowing the player to compare current performance to their career average.
- Detailed Statistics are now viewable while choosing an Attachment in the Gunsmith.
Maps
- Added spawn anchors to many maps in order to influence the flow of combat in the direction of each map’s intended design.
- In Team Deathmatch, team-owned areas are favored by spawn selection and resistant to enemy pressure.
- In Domination, spawn selection is now more resistant to enemy pressure on flags, improving consistency by favoring owned flags.
Estate
- Added frontline logic to prevent unintentionally frequent spawn flips.
Favela
- Decreased the priority of spawn points near the Shacks and Construction Site.
Highrise
- Decreased the priority of spawn points in the Actibase and Phonic Tunnels.
Gameplay
- Adjusted footstep volume to further distinguish enemy and friendly players.
- Added an option to double-tap the aim down sights button to activate Tac-Stance.
- Refreshed Default Loadout options with a widened range of content.
Movement
- Sprint input while sliding will now cancel the slide animation.
- Decreased aim down sights time penalty while jumping by 20%.
Settings
- Added an option to double-tap the aim down sights button to activate Tac-Stance.
- Added new options to Slide/Dive Behavior. Tap to slide, disables the dive. Tap to dive, disables the slide.
The CoD: Modern Warfare III Day 1 update offers more minor tweaks and bug fixes than we can list here -- you can check out the full, unabridged patch notes here.
Activision has also detailed some of the new features coming to the CoD Ricochet Anti-Cheat tech, including advanced machine learning to identify new cheating behavior. Amusingly, Ricochet has also added to its list of in-game “mitigation” tactics – essentially pranks pulled on cheaters. The new one, called “Splat” will remove a cheater’s parachute mid-jump, causing them to go, well… splat.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III launches in full on PC, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, and PS5 tomorrow (November 10).
