Activision and Raven Software are starting to crack down hard on Call of Duty: Modern Warfare Remastered cheaters and ‘boosters’, by banning offending users and purging their records from the shooter’s online leaderboards.
Users on social media [1, 2] have been reporting in their droves over the past several days that their accounts have been temporarily suspended or banned from playing Raven’s remastered FPS online, as a result of a practice known to CoD fans as ‘boosting’.
Boosting is the act of two or more players colluding to repeatedly kill each other in order to complete challenges, pad their stats, gain rewards and increase their XP. It is heavily frowned upon by other players, and banned by several of the studios who are responsible for developing the yearly franchise; Raven included.
Not satisfied with simply banning players, the developer has also been cleaning up the game’s leaderboards; removing offending players’ stats entirely.
This wave of enforcement action was pre-empted by the game’s lead designer Amos Hodge, who had earlier in the week asked Modern Warfare Remastered players to report known cheaters and boosters, warning users that a leaderboard cleanup was coming soon:
Report boosters and cheaters in game by selecting their name and hitting report. Bans and leaderboard cleanup coming soon! #MWRemastered
— Amos Hodge (@wendellwobble) November 26, 2016
Hodge later clarified that only offending players’ statistics would be removed, as opposed to a complete leaderboard wipe.
@Zoerid just for the obvious offenders at the top of the leaderboards
— Amos Hodge (@wendellwobble) November 27, 2016
What do you make of boosting in Call of Duty games and first-person shooters in general? Are Activision and Raven’s actions warranted? Sound off in the comments below.