The Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 beta elicited a plethora of feedback from the community. While developer Infinity Ward has chosen to bypass some of this feedback, the developers have agreed with the community on some points. One of the points the two sides agree on is the user interface (UI) that was present in Modern Warfare 2 during the beta.
The UI was a constant source of complaints from players, particularly from those using a controller. Players found it extremely difficult to navigate the various menus with any consistency. It seemed like there were several buttons you had to press to just get to one specific menu or area of the game. For example, navigating the Gunsmith required several button presses just to edit a loadout. Trying to see a weapon platform’s progression took even more button presses, all of which simply felt unnecessary. There was even also a convoluted process to simply bring up the text chat feature when in a match.
Infinity Ward agreed with players that UI felt too cluttered and clunky overall. As a result, the developers will be making some changes to the UI in Modern Warfare 2 for the game’s full release. They confirmed this in their community update for the first weekend of the beta. However, one industry insider has warned fans to not get their hopes up too much. @RalphsValve tweeted that the UI design in the MW2 beta was more or less final, and not a rough draft like many players thought.
Yes, the UI/UX Director at Infinity Ward previously worked as a UI Director at Hulu.
On release, you won’t see much of, if at all, a difference to the UI given their plans for other shared experiences post-launch.
The #MW2 BETA wasn’t a draft, it’s final.
— Ralph (@RalphsValve) September 27, 2022
Ralph warns players that Infinity Ward’s plans for post-launch limit them in regards to overhauling the UI. The insider leaked some of these plans earlier this year, with the developers apparently implementing a subscription scheme, a mobile application, and a redesign for the store.
As Ralph also points out, some previous UI/UX employees at Hulu have joined Infinity Ward for MW2. Many players felt that the UI design for MW2 multiplayer felt more like a streaming service than that of a video game. It seems that Infinity Ward wants to trend in this direction given the recent hirings of ex-Hulu employees.
We’ll have to wait and see what changes, if any, Infinity Ward makes to the UI in MW2. While the developers said they’ll be working on some changes for the full release, it seems unlikely we’ll see any major overhaul of the user interface.
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