Call Of Duty: Vanguard Is Off To A Rocky Start

Despite only being released this past Friday, "Call of Duty: Vanguard" has already been a source of contention among gamers. Prior to release, the "Call of Duty" community had already expressed concerns regarding cheaters ruining the game for everyone, an issue that has adversely effected "Call of Duty: Warzone" for a while now. The announcement that "Call of Duty: Vanguard" wouldn't be released with Ranked Play was another disappointment to fans. Factor in the increasingly complicated lawsuits against Activision Blizzard that arose during the game's development, and it becomes obvious that the newest iteration in the "Call of Duty" franchise had a lot working against it prior to its release.

This has been reflected in the critical reception for the game, which has been about as mixed as it could get. While mainstream critics have given "Call of Duty: Vanguard" mostly positive reviews for its campaign mode and fast-paced multiplayer mode, player reviews have been much more polarized. Meanwhile, big name streamers like Dr. Disrespect are just about ready to give up on the game entirely due to its hectic multiplayer pace.

These issues have given the latest "Call of Duty" title a rocky beginning to its life cycle. Fans have noted that the current state of the game's Search & Destroy mode might only make things worse.

In Search & Destroy, players are divided into teams with one team needing to plant a bomb on a targeted site while the other is tasked with defending said site. With no available respawns, it has become one of the most competitive game modes that "Call of Duty" offers and provides a different flavor to the series' typical 'run-and-gun' style. Unfortunately, this popular game mode has fallen victim to an exploit that favors the attacking team, basically ruining the experience entirely.

After the attacking team plants the bomb, the status icon above the Bomb Site changes to "Defend," which is not out of the ordinary. What is out of the ordinary, however, is that if the defending team attempts to diffuse the bomb, the status changes from "Defend" to "Defuse Target," alerting the attacking team that someone on the opposition is in the act of defusing the planted explosive. This glitch gives the attacking team a huge advantage, tipping them off and essentially robbing the defusing team of a fighting chance.

One player, MuTeX, posted a full rundown of the exploit on Twitter, urging the developers to fix the issue "ASAP." While some argued that this was possibly an intentional design choice on Sledgehammer's part, MuTeX countered that this is a known bug that has appeared in past "Call of Duty" titles, only to be patched out later. Hopefully that's the case this time, or "Vanguard" players might have a hard time enjoying Search & Destroy.