Call of Duty isn’t exactly known for its viability as a competitive game straight out of the box. Professional players typically all have to agree to a complex series of gentlemen’s rules to keep overpowered guns and utility from making the game borderline unplayable at a high level.
So, when Shroud says that he isn’t down with prospective pros wasting their talents on CoD, he isn’t exactly wrong.
There’s a lot of truth to his words. No esports scene is divorced from its casual scene quite like Call of Duty titles are. It’s genuinely not the same game. Other titles, like Counter-Strike, Valorant, even Halo are more suited to the competitive gamer.
Every year, the Call of Duty cycle for competitive players is the same. They find out what their GAs are going to be in the first month, and the ranked mode rarely makes it into the game within six months of release. By the time the meta settles and solid maps are in the game, the next CoD comes out, and the cycle repeats again. Not to mention that CoD games have been releasing in objectively poor states lately, with tons of bugs and other frustrations.
By comparison, other titles are built specifically for competitive play, or offer some kind of consistency between competitive and casual play. The Call of Duty competitive scene is strong, don’t get me wrong, but other games are simply better put-together.
If you’re in love with Call of Duty and what it brings to the table, keep going. If you’re on the fence, it might be time to check out another shooter. You might just like what you find without having to jump through a bunch of hoops.
