Call of Duty WW2's Gun Game is awesome, but it has a serious AFK problem

Call of Duty WW2 has a number of cool modes, but one in particular is held up by players as being especially awesome: Gun Game.

Here's how it works: Gun Game is a six-player free-for-all mode in which you are given a random weapon to use from a tier of weapons. Kill another player and you immediately get another random weapon from the next tier of weapons to use. The first player to get a kill with all 18 weapon tiers, or the player who used the most weapons when the time runs out, wins the game. Gun Game looks like this:

Gun Game is fast-paced and an interesting test of skill, as it challenges players to use lots of different types of weapons well. Unfortunately, it's also not always available to play - developer Sledgehammer adds it to the game every now and then (much to the annoyance of its fans).

Currently, Gun Game is live, but it's being ruined by players who pop their controller down and go AFK (away from keyboard) for the entire duration of the match.

AFK players in competitive multiplayer shooters is not a new problem, of course. And Gun Game has always had an AFK problem because of the unique way in which it works. But Gun Game is suffering badly from AFK players right now because of one particular Special Order that's currently available to take on.

WW2 has a Special Order to complete a whopping 80 multiplayer matches. People really want to do this because the reward is an "Epic Bribe and Resistance Uniform Bribe". Epic Bribes guarantee an Epic quality item (Call of Duty WW2's standard loot boxes do not), so they're coveted.

Most of Call of Duty WW2's game modes take around 10 minutes to complete, so you're looking at around 14 hours of play to smash through 80 multiplayer matches. But players are blitzing the Special Order, which went live alongside the weekly reset yesterday, 13th February, in super quick time - and it's clear AFKing Gun Game is the key.

Gun Game is a popular mode to AFK in because it's one of the quickest to end in the game, and it doesn't affect many of your stats because weapon and division progression is not considered. If you AFK you run the risk of being reported by other players, but most people in the community aren't particularly worried about that. And there's seemingly no in-game punishment for AFKing, either.

So, what we have here is a perfect storm: the combination of a Special Order to play a huge number of matches and a game mode with which you can speed through them without playing. I spent a couple of hours in Gun Game last night and can report there are a lot more AFK players than is normal for Call of Duty WW2. On the one hand, these players are easy kills. On the other, they're ruining the game for everyone. What can't be argued is they're cheating the system.

As you'd expect, players aren't happy.

The Call of Duty community is calling on Sledgehammer to address this AFK problem, but so far it hasn't commented. Hopefully the developer can come up with a solution that punishes players who AFK - before fans ditch Gun Game entirely.

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