Treyarch has made a big change to damage flinch for Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

Publish date: 2023-01-02

Treyarch has made a big change to the way damage flinch works for Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War.

In previous Call of Duty games, including last year's Modern Warfare, when you take damage you suffer damage flinch. That is, your crosshair moves up slightly as bullets hit you.

This damage flinch effect has proved controversial among the Call of Duty competitive multiplayer community, with many saying they'd prefer to play without having their aim disrupted by being shot. Well, it sounds like Treyarch is giving the people what the people want.

In a tweet, Tony Flame, Treyarch's wonderfully-named lead game designer, said damage flinch no longer affects the aim position of your weapon. In Black Ops Cold War damage flinch is primarily a feedback mechanism to let you know you're taking damage.

"No more flinch headshots," Flame said.

(A flinch headshot is what happens when someone shoots you as you're aiming lower than your enemy's head, and the damage flinch pushes your crosshair up to hit a headshot.)

Damage Flinch has been redesigned in Black Ops Cold War. Flinch is now primarily a feedback mechanism to help you understand you’re taking damage, without affecting the aim position of your weapon. Your weapon will move with your screen to stay on target. No more flinch headshots

— Tony Flame (@Tony_Flame) September 12, 2020 To see this content please enable targeting cookies. Manage cookie settings

Call of Duty YouTuber Xclusive Ace showed Black Ops Cold War's redesigned damage flinch in a video published to Twitter. As Flame suggested, the crosshair barely moves as the player is shot.

Lots of people have expressed concern (rightfully so) about how high the Headshot multiplier is in Cold War due to flinch but it turns out there's little to no flinch when shot as far as I can tell. The deeper I look, the more I'm seeing a really solid gameplay foundation pic.twitter.com/IGQvKVdotm

— Xclusive Ace (@TheXclusiveAce) September 11, 2020 To see this content please enable targeting cookies. Manage cookie settings

This change is in keeping with Treyarch's apparent philosophy for Black Ops Cold War: clarity and gameplay are the priorities, winning out over pretty much everything else. There's more on the announced Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War multiplayer changes here.

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