There was a pleasant surprise waiting for players when Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 went live. XP tokens from previous Call of Duty games were there sat in everyone's inventory, making it easier to face the grind and level up characters or weapons. Usually, players can get these by completing limited time events, finishing the battle pass, or sometimes via collaborations.
Legacy XP tokens aren't unheard of. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 and Modern Warfare 3 both let players use previously purchased or unlocked items and cosmetics as well as double XP tokens from various Call of Duty games.
Unfortunately, this time it didn't seem like the feature was intentional. One of the latest Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 updates erased legacy tokens, or as Activision put it: "Fixed an issue that incorrectly allowed legacy XP tokens to be activated in the Black Ops 6 UI." We just can't have nice things.
This sudden change was matched by Black Ops 6 players who did a complete 180, going from praising Treyarch for providing them with this helping hand to condemning the devs for patching out something that everyone wanted. Players were calling the move "greedy" and "a joke", with one arguing that legacy tokens were disabled "to artificially inflate [Treyarch’s] retention metrics." But the story didn't stop there. Over the weekend players carried on telling Treyarch just how upset they were about this change, and it actually ended up leading to something.
"With the start of Season 01, a UI bug allowed players to activate legacy XP tokens in Black Ops 6," Treyarch says. "Unfortunately, it also introduced some potential risk to game stability, which is why it was patched yesterday.
"We realize how much players appreciate being able to redeem legacy XP tokens in both BO6 and Warzone, so we are currently testing a way to implement this change correctly in a future update. This allows us time to ensure stability is maintained before we reintroduce this feature."
I’m not qualified to comment on game stability. But it’s easy to imagine that an unexpected increase in how much XP the average player could earn may potentially throw a spanner in the works for future time sensitive events, as players could complete things that require XP quicker.
"In the interim, players can activate any legacy XP tokens in Warzone," Treyarch continues. "Any tokens applied in Warzone will also apply to Black Ops 6 should you switch titles or modes. We look forward to sharing more about this change next week. Thank you for your patience."
I'm glad that Treyarch came to the conclusion that legacy tokens were worth the time and effort to figure out and reinstate, but let’s be honest, players are likely getting this feature thanks to luck and not kindness. If a UI bug hadn't accidentally popped up and given players access to legacy XP tokens then Treyarch might well have kept this feature under lock and key.
