Activision Blizzard is currently facing serious ongoing allegations of harassment and mistreatment of marginalized workers. To learn more, please visit our timeline as well as our in-depth report on the subject.
If you have ever cheated in Call of Duty: Warzone and were subsequently banned as a result, it looks like you won't be able to play the next Call of Duty game, Vanguard.
Spotted first by Eurogamer, several images have appeared online, including cheating Discord servers and forums, showing players who received either an account or hardware ban in Call of Duty: Warzone also being barred from playing the upcoming open beta for Vanguard. Call of Duty website, CharlieIntel confirmed those with an account or hardware ban in Warzone are banned from Vanguard.
If you are currently banned in Call of Duty: Warzone – including hardware or account banned – you are banned from playing Call of Duty: Vanguard.
For those in the cheats Discords/forums etc. asking why, I think it's pretty obvious why. But thought I'd let you know.
— CharlieIntel (@charlieINTEL) September 16, 2021
Unlike account bans, which impact an individual account, hardware bans are for serial cheaters, preventing these repeat offenders from creating a new account each time their previous account is banned. Activision confirmed in April that it issues these hardware bans to address the ongoing issue of cheating in Call of Duty: Warzone, which is one of many games that has a problem with players cutting corners to gain unfair advantages in-game.
Activision has also been cracking down on the influx of cheaters invading Warzone. Most notably, its subsidiary, Raven Software, confirmed in August that it had banned a substantial amount of Warzone accounts, with the studio banning more than 100,000 in a single day.
Taylor is the Associate Tech Editor at IGN. You can follow her on Twitter @TayNixster.