Warzone 2 WSOW finally announces return after two delays

Ryan Lemay
A graphic for the 2023 World Series of Warzone.

Activision announced new dates for the 2023 World Series of Warzone Qualifiers after server issues plagued Warzone 2 private matches.

Call of Duty’s annual WSOW tournament returned in April. This iteration offers up a $1.2 million prize pool, including a first-ever LAN Grand Final for a $600,000 total prize. In-Game Open matches went off without a hitch, as 50 trios from NA and EU advanced to the Qualifiers stage.

Server issues forced Activision to delay Qualifers matches. Warzone 2 community members flamed the “embarrassing” postponement. ModernWarzone reported that the servers crashed once AI and Strongholds spawned into the map.

Players took the opportunity to plead with the developers to remove AI enemies from the battle royale sequel. After two weeks of silence, Activision provided a long-awaited update on the tournament’s status.

Warzone 2 World Series of Warzone is coming back

On May 22, Activision confirmed: “The World Series of Warzone is excited to announce that the tournament will resume on May 31!”

The North America Qualifiers take place on May 31. From there, 25 teams advance to play in the Regional Finals on June 7 alongside 25 other invited teams. The Europe Qualifiers will be held on June 1 with the Reginal Finals kicking off on June 8.

All events begin at 1 PM EST. Individual competitors will stream Qualifiers matches, and the Regional Finals will be streamed on the official Call of Duty Twitch channel.

The developers confirmed a fix for server-related gameplay issues on Raven Software’s Trello board on May 18.

Warzone 2 players have long called for the removal of AI, but it appears as though they will need to wait longer for any such change. Raven Software made no note of any AI changes in the server-related patch.

Hopefully, the fix does enough to keep servers stable enough for the WSOW Qualifers matches.