Modern Warfare finally offers players the ability to see their death count during matches, but what was once a staple Call of Duty feature now comes at a price.
In past Call of Duty games, the in-game scoreboard for a standard multiplayer mode like Team Deathmatch would show each player’s kills, deaths, and assists. At any point during a match, a player could hit a button to pop up a scoreboard and view their stats.
Many players have appreciated this simple feature, as it can be a great way to check their progress and determine if they need to adjust their playstyle. I’m a player who likes to rush, but if a quick scoreboard glance told me I had more deaths than expected, I’m enticed to slow down. In Team Deathmatch, a mode where every death obviously matters, I don’t want to be the player who accumulated an outsized portion of the death count that caused my team to lose. And in objective-based respawn modes, I don’t want to feed the opposing team a bunch of killstreaks that could cause us to struggle to win the objective.
Unfortunately, deaths are not tracked on Modern Warfare’s scoreboard during most standard modes. The scoreboard only shows the kills and assists for each player. How many deaths each player has racked up is now a surprise saved for the final scoreboard that shows after the match has concluded.
The community has been very vocal about its dislike of the removal of such a simple and constant feature within Call of Duty’s multiplayer, but death counts remain absent from the in-match scoreboards of most modes.
That upset has grown now that the cosmetic store for December’s “Season One” content drop features a watch that tracks the player’s kills and deaths. The “Time to Die” watch is found within the “Mother Russia” bundle, which is a 10-piece cosmetic collection priced at 2000 COD Points, or $US20 ($29).
There aren’t any stat-boosting DLC items in Modern Warfare, so this doesn’t give the owner of the watch any other gameplay advantages. But seeing one’s death count should be made available to all players, not just those willing to pay for it.
Modern Warfare’s inaugural Battle Pass is a huge step up from the loot box nightmares of last year’s Black Ops 4, but it seems outlandish to have a watch in a $US20 ($29) cosmetic bundle provide a lacking staple of Call of Duty’s in-game scoreboard. Whether this was orchestrated to sell cosmetics or completely unintentional, the fact remains that a DLC watch is now the only way to see your death count in most game modes.
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