Xbox‘s Chief Technology Officer has just announced that the company is taking steps to improve its review distribution system. This announcement comes in the wake of a recent controversy surrounding Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4, which seemingly had no official Xbox reviews at launch.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 has managed to break the series mold once more, at least if the game’s critical reception is anything to go by. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 currently has the highest OpenCritic score in franchise history, boasting a Top Critic Average of 86. For reference, Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 earned a score of 65, Black Ops 6 got 83, and the last two Modern Warfare entries received a 58 and 75, with Modern Warfare 3 earning the lower number.
Xbox Is Improving its Review System After Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 Controversy
Xbox Chief Technology Officer Scott Van Vilet has just announced via a Twitter post that the company is in the process of reevaluating its review code distribution system. The Xbox CTO admits that “reviewing a game on XBOX takes too many steps today,” and that press and creators should just be able to “redeem and play.” This is something that the Xbox technical team is reportedly “building toward,” with the first updates to the system expected to roll out soon, though it’s currently unclear what these updates will look like. This statement comes two days after controversy began to brew around Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4‘s launch reviews.
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Image via Activision -
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Image by Josh Drechsler, Source: Activision
On October 26, the official Call of Duty Twitter account made a post celebrating Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4‘s critical reception. The post highlighted the latest Call of Duty entry’s Metacritic scores, stating that it earned an 89 for its PlayStation 5 version and an 86 on PC. Fans were quick to point out that it was odd Call of Duty didn’t highlight the game’s critical reception on Xbox, given that it’s now a first-party IP. As pointed out by Windows Central, this seems to be because Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 doesn’t actually have a Metacritic score for its Xbox version, which is still true at the time of writing.
In Windows Central’s report, the lack of Modern Warfare 4 reviews on Xbox could be due to the complicated review code distribution system that Xbox currently has in place. While redeeming a review copy for platforms like PlayStation and Steam is often as easy as entering a code and downloading the game, on Xbox, some reviewers are asked to hand over their Xbox Live Device ID to PR, who have to manually “whitelist” the reviewer’s hardware before they can gain access to the game.
GameRant’s Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 review was actually carried out on Xbox Series X, and is currently one of only two official Xbox reviews counted on Metacritic. GameRant’s own Dalton Cooper gave Modern Warfare 4 a 10/10, calling it “the ultimate Call of Duty experience, with a potentially all-time-best campaign, action-packed multiplayer, and deep DMZ mode.”
- Released
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October 23, 2026
- Multiplayer
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Online Multiplayer, Online Co-Op
