High-Profile Players Are Quitting Call Of Duty: Warzone Over Cheaters

Cheating is an issue that has plagued Call of Duty: Warzone since its launch. Just last month players were banned from a Twitch Rivals event over cheating accusations that were later recanted. Now, the issue has gotten so bad that several prominent players are calling it quits.

YouTuber Vikkstar (aka Vikram Singh Barn) was one of these content creators. In a video on his channel--which boasts over seven million followers--posted at the end of January, Vikkstar explained that while he still occasionally streams Warzone, he won't be making or posting videos about it anymore because the game is in "the worst state it has ever been" due to hackers.

"Activision isn't addressing how many hackers there are in the game," Vikkstar said in his video. According to the YouTuber, when he was playing before filing this video he ran into a hacker who was live-streaming themselves hacking on Facebook Gaming, and apparently had been for hours with hundreds of viewers. "The playerbase of the game is now so saturated with hackers, you tend to find them in every single lobby."

Vikkstar isn't alone in this decision. Another streamer and member of FaZe, Nicholas "NICKMERCS" Kolcheff has also stopped playing, tweeting that he didn't think authentic Warzone tournaments were possible with the current state of the game back in January. Others, like YouTuber Drift0r, have even reported cheats like high-skill players forcing their way into low-level lobbies to both outlets like PC Gamer and Activision. But so far there hasn't been a permanent fix to keep hackers out.

From going out of their way to avoid Warzone's skill-based matchmaking, to multiple iterations of the stim glitch, cheaters have continued to find ways to mess with the game and make it less fun for others. While Infinity Ward has issued warnings and bans in the past, it looks like beating back cheaters is going to be an ongoing struggle.