Activision has revealed significant changes to the Call of Duty battle pass for Season 1 of Black Ops 7 that should make progression a lot quicker.
The battle pass has been the subject of much debate in recent years, with Call of Duty players often bemoaning how long it takes to unlock all its content — even if you pay for the premium version and, on top of that, the more expensive BlackCell version.
In a new blog post, Activision said it had “taken learnings” from Black Ops 6 battle pass completion times and made tuning adjustments for “a more satisfying journey.” The result is each season’s battle pass in Black Ops 7 should be “more rewarding for your time spent in-game, no matter where you’re playing across all parts of the game.”
So, how does this work? Earlier pages in the Black Ops 7 battle pass can now be completed faster with fewer tiers needed to unlock High-Value Target (HVT) content at the end of the page, while later pages in the battle pass will contain more rewards. This means players will earn more HVT content sooner across all 100 tiers, Activision said.
And, for the first time, Activision is adding the ability to earn battle pass tokens through completing daily challenges, which are now available not only in Multiplayer, Zombies, and Call of Duty: Warzone, but also Co-Op Campaign and Endgame. On certain days in the season, completion of your bonus daily challenge will grant you a battle pass token, which can be used right away to unlock a tier.
Call of Duty players who regularly grind through the battle pass will welcome these changes, particularly the addition of earning tokens via challenges. That should speed things up by default, but it remains to be seen how progression overall will feel now the later pages of the battle pass have more content to work through.
The Season 1 battle pass includes up to 1,100 COD Points, 11 operator skins, 26 blueprints and weapons, and 119 total rewards, 23 of which are free to earn, including two new base weapons. You can buy the battle pass for 1,100 COD Points, or get the battle pass bundle for 2,400 COD Points, which also grants you 20 Tokens to use.
Earlier this week, new data showed Black Ops 7 sales were lagging behind those of Battlefield 6 and even Black Ops 6. Activision has yet to announce a sales figure for the game, or comment on its commercial performance. Microsoft has yet to say whether Black Ops 7 boosted Game Pass subscriptions in any way.
Activision is also in hot water with a member of the U.S. Congress, who called out the company’s use of generative AI in Call of Duty: Black Ops 7, demanding tighter regulation to “prevent companies from using AI to eliminate jobs.”
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Wesley is Director, News at IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at [email protected] or confidentially at [email protected].
