As most battle royale players will say anymore, it's not always about winning. It's also about having a really cool skin. That's why it's unsurprising to hear that Call of Duty: Warzone players are frustrated with a recent decision by Activision Blizzard regarding one of the battle royale's Season 5 skins. Call of Duty: Warzone players claim that Activision Blizzard misrepresented how to acquire one of Season 5's heavily advertised skins to try and get them to spend more.
A post on Reddit shared within the Call of Duty: Warzone community calls attention to an issue with the Season 5 skin named Kyubi. The Kyubi skin is for Call of Duty's new Season 5 Operator named Kitsune, in which she wears a somewhat nefarious version of a traditional Japanese fox mask. The Reddit post calls attention to the fact that the Kyubi skin isn't included in Season 5's standard battle pass. Instead, it's locked into Call of Duty: Warzone's premium battle pass bundle.
The original poster on Reddit, as well as a significant number of posters in the thread, claim that they feel like they were tricked by Call of Duty: Warzone's marketing for Season 5. They believed that the Kyubi skin would be unlocked as part of the Season 5 standard battle pass and that locking it into the battle pass bundle is unfair. It's especially frustrating for some players because earning 1,000CP in-game without spending money is a realistic possibility, but earning the 2,400CP for the bundle is too much.
[!ATTENTION!]: Getting 1000 CP regular Battle Pass do not unlock limited time Kyubi skin. If u want this skin, YOU NEED to get the 2400 Battle Pass bundle with Tier Skip in order to unlock this skin. from CODWarzone
Others in the Reddit thread correctly note that Activision Blizzard has called attention to the Kyubi skin being limited in this way frequently. In the blog post for Season 5 of Call of Duty: Warzone, there's a section on unlocking the Kyubi skin via the battle pass bundle as part of a limited time offer at Season 5's launch. It's also noted in-game alongside the purchase of the battle pass bundle.
It's also correct that Activision Blizzard heavily advertised the Kyubi skin in advertising for Season 5. That includes image-based advertisements with no text or fine print on them, trailers that showcased both Kitsune and the Kyubi skin, and elsewhere. In other words, it's not surprising that many Call of Duty: Warzone players associated the Kyubi skin with the Season 5 battle pass.
In the end, the Kyubi skin is just that, a skin. Those who purchased the Season 5 battle pass for Call of Duty: Warzone still have a wide variety of content to unlock. There's even a really impressive Kitsune skin that unlocks at tier 100 named Samurai. One would hope Activision Blizzard would take Warzone players' frustration to heart, but when it comes to live service games and their monetization this is not uncommon and unlikely to change.
Call of Duty: Warzone is available now on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.