The Birds Mean More Than You Realized In Warzone

The wild birds in Call of Duty: Warzone may have become one of the best unintended tools in the game. According to a thread on Reddit, some players have noticed that the birds on the Warzone map will react if they are disturbed by another player. Keeping an eye out for sudden flocks of escaping birds looks to be a decent strategy for finding enemies who are hiding in wooded areas.

In a video clip posted by Reddit user Noahthegoofy, we get to see this interesting strategy in action. As the match-ending gas begins to close in on the map, Noahthegoofy notices a flock of birds taking off. Out of curiosity, Noahthegoofy pulls out a heartbeat monitor to see if he can pick up any nearby enemies. Nothing shows on the monitor, but someone can be seen coming out from behind cover just a few moments later, right where the birds were flocking. Noah goofy promptly takes out the enemy who was seemingly ratted out by the birds.

However, despite how it appears in the video, it seems as though not everyone in the thread is convinced that the birds can be used as a sign of an enemy presence. A couple of people have theorized that the birds are only flocking closer together because of the gas closing in on the area. One player suggested that Noahthegoofy had simply seen a wild coincidence, that seeing the enemy right after the flock of birds dispersed was "just good timing ... and a random bird animation."

One user wrote, "Just had [a flock of birds fly off] in a game with just gas no person. Not saying it can't happen with people too but I think any active object can set it off."

Apparently the number of birds may vary depending on where you are on the map and what kind of disturbance has been caused for those birds. As one Redditor explains, "No, bird flocks are common throughout the match, but only in areas with lots of trees. Single birds tell you nothing, bird flocks seem to get stirred by players, but I very often don't see enemies when a flock flies off ... it is [also] possible you can see the birds you yourself stir."

It's interesting that people are finding other ways of hunting down enemies, especially considering how annoying some of the game's shortcomings have been in this regard. One of the most common complaints against Call of Duty: Warzone is that the audio of the game isn't mixed to the many players' liking.

One of the most high profile critics of Warzone's sound mixing is none other than Dr Disrespect. Last month, Dr Disrespect went into a rage over the fact that he couldn't hear any enemies coming and couldn't figure out where noises that he could hear were coming from.

During a stream in which the Doc was taking a ton of gunfire, he was clearly becoming more and more frustrated. He said to viewers, "[Expletive] audio is so distracting in this game. It's so distracting in this game, audio. It's so — it's just such a distraction. Worst audio design ever in the history of first-person shooter games: I think it's this game, I really do."

Other streamers have taken the game's sound mixing to task. One of these was CouRage, who joked on Twitter that "Enemy footsteps in Warzone" are some of the "quietest sounds in the world."

While it's still a little unclear whether or not the birds are a decent gauge to go by, it seems pretty clear that they can be disturbed by players who stumble upon them. It's the apparent inconsistencies in the birds' behavior that has led some people to be somewhat dubious of this strategy. Again, this is a game where you can kill someone inside a house by running a truck into the outside wall of the house. In other words, realism and consistency has been a bit of a problem during the first few months of Warzone's release.

With all of the rumored updates coming to Warzone in the near future (some of which may tie into the mysterious Call of Duty: Black Ops — Cold War), it will be interesting if the birds' behavior or flight patterns change at all. This may be a sound strategy that players can carry into the next season of Warzone. In the meantime, it's worth keeping an eye on Warzone's feathered civilians. It could mean the difference between victory and a trip to the Gulag.