Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 is one of the most anticipated games of the year, looking to expand on its 2019 predecessor in some bold new ways, and once again breathe new life into the Call of Duty formula. Eager fans have been able to try out Modern Warfare 2 via its recent Beta, which began last week for PlayStation players, and runs until Tuesday 27. Though it hasn't shown the game's whole hand, the Modern Warfare 2 Beta has given fans a much better look at how this sequel is improving on its predecessor, and the new content it's adding. But as well as impressing a good portion of fans, it has exposed some of the game's cracks, many of which can be fixed pretty easily.
One of the smaller issues fans have spotted after Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2's Beta revolves around the game's Invasion mode. One of the new additions in this year's CoD, Invasion sees two teams of 20 players face off on a pretty huge map. Players are able to use tanks, boats, and helicopters, as well as a range of killstreaks that are dropped at certain intervals. With the addition of enemy AI, there's always a lot going on in this mode, and that chaos often leads to quick deaths. Unfortunately, Modern Warfare 2's Invasion mode sends players all the way back to the spawn area upon death, which has led some fans to ask for a quality of life feature present in the Battlefield franchise.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2's Invasion Mode Should Add Squad Spawn
The Battlefield franchise has a few distinct mechanics that set it apart from other contemporary military shooter series like Call of Duty, and one of the most prominent is the ability to spawn on squadmates. With Battlefield being a much larger-scale game, with maps that are often triple or quadruple the size of an average Call of Duty map, DICE introduced the ability to spawn right next to a teammate. This drastically reduces downtime in Battlefield, with players being able to jump straight into the action, and stay there even after death.
Squad spawning is a feature that should definitely be added to Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2's Invasion mode. When a player dies in Invasion, they'll respawn all the way back at their team's base. While Modern Warfare 2's Sariff Bay isn't quite as big as some of Battlefield's maps, it's still pretty massive compared to the rest of MW2's line-up, and with such a short time-to-kill, players may spend more time running to the objective than they are actually holding the point or engaging with enemy forces.
What makes squad spawning's absence in Invasion even more bizarre is that the feature is already present in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2's Ground War mode. Ground War is certainly a larger-scale mode, with 64 players going head-to-head, but the map size is pretty much the same, and therefore squad spawning should be allowed in Invasion as well.
Based on the new movement mechanics and visibility restrictions, it seems as though Infinity Ward is trying to make this year's Call of Duty much more strategical and team-based than previous entries in the franchise, but for that approach to feel satisfying, certain quality of life features like squad spawning need to be present, as that's simply a staple for the genre now and players have come to expect it.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 launches on October 28 for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.