Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 came out yesterday (you can check out Steven's review in progress here), and players are already finding ways to manipulate the game's systems to gain an advantage over other players. Specifically, if you use a third-person emote, the camera will pull back and rotate at will, allowing you to peek around corners. It could prove especially useful in the battle royale Blackout mode, letting you see far-off players while hiding behind a tree.
You can see one such example in action below, courtesy of Reddit user -Sleeper_, who uses the Sitting Bull emote to crouch behind a low wall and take a good, long look at the surrounding area (-Sleeper_ is also the source for the image at the top of this article).
Developer Treyarch has been quick to respond. In a Reddit post detailing day one bug fixes and planned changes, it said that it was "aware that players have been able to use Gestures (often referred to by the community as 'Emotes') to peek around corners in modes where that can create an unfair advantage". The planned fix will create a new system that "disables free look and applies different camera settings" for emotes in competitive game modes, the developer said.
The current system for emotes will continue to be used elsewhere in the game "where corner peeking won’t affect gameplay balance", such as in the pre-game lobby for rounds of Blackout, it added.
I'm surprised the problem wasn't caught in pre-release testing, but at least it's getting fixed sharpish.
Thanks, Eurogamer.
