Are jumpscares ever “too scary”? They’re an integral part of visual horror, so without that heart-pounding terror they bring, the horror atmosphere falls miserably flat. Yet, it would seem that Call of Duty: Warzone has managed to make their Halloween event just too frightening.
I say this with enormous trepidation, but I don’t play CoD, ever. I have no interest in it, save for any decent memes that come from the fandom, which I’d argue are few and far between. However, while I don’t play Warzone, I am seriously tempted now, just to see how high out of my seat I fly into the air when I get spooked. Judging by player comments so far, I think I’d almost have a heart attack.
Modern Warfare III is on the way.
“Bro, this scared the ever loving s**t out of me today. F**king hate it,” complained one gamer, while another player explained their gripes more eloquently, “The volume is stupidly loud, like genuinely damage your hearing if you are wearing a headset loud. I had to lower my game volume so much that I couldn't hear anything else, so it made it impossible to play the game.”
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It would seem it isn’t the images that are scaring people, but the sound. If you trawl Reddit long enough – don’t hurt yourself that way, please – you’ll notice that nearly everyone taking part in The Haunting event says the same thing: it’s just too loud.
Not only is the volume wreaking havoc but so too is the frequency with which these jumpscares happen. “The frequency is so much that it moves from fun to annoying,” begins one Redditor who’s experienced this problem firsthand. “It would be a fantastic feature if it was infrequent enough that it let the tension build, but it's like 60% of boxes. I legit had three boxes IN THE SAME ROOM have jumpscares.”
Oh, and it's a feature you can’t switch off, despite a settings option that says you can; the feature switches off the scares in Battle Pass only. Sucks to be a scaredy cat.
If you prefer your horror to be of the flesh-eating undead variety, you can leave behind the chests of Warzone and look to the future, to Modern Warfare III, because an open-world zombie horror is headed its way. Granted, that’s a ways off, but it’s something to look forward to if cheap thrills don’t do it for you… or if they’ve driven you into a hospital bed, close to death. Happy Halloween-ing!
Featured Image Credit: ActivisionTopics: Activision, Call Of Duty, Call Of Duty Warzone