“The Season 4 download is going to be large,” Williams confirms, adding, “In order to reduce the overall disc space that MW and WZ take up, we’re compressing a bunch of assets. Once installed, the S4 launch will only take up an additional 4GB on consoles for all of the new content.”
So, if you’ve been wondering why the Season 4 download is so massive, the answer is all about the files themselves. In order to make Modern Warfare smaller, developers have to compress parts of the game to reduce its footprint. However, in order for that strategy to be effective, players must be re-sent these smaller versions, some of which may be reworked duplicates of content they already have.
This much was affirmed by Williams in a follow up tweet in which she says, “We’re continuing to sweep all assets to make size reductions where we can, and also further optimize future patches for size.”
The story of update 1.22 is similar to that of the whopping 60GB patch that kicked off Season 2 of Modern Warfare in February. At that time, Infinity Ward Production Director Paul Haile said, “In this case, we’re re-sending new asset packs to reduce the overall size of the game. This is what has caused the update today to be so big.” What we’re seeing now is essentially a continuation of that established initiative.
Thankfully, however, recent updates have provided users with tools to free up space by deleting specific asset packs, if need be. So, if you’re finished with the Modern Warfare campaign, for example, it’s possible to remove that part of the game without impacting the rest. This is done by opening Modern Warfare and going to Options > General > Game Installs.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare has been a hard drive hog since the game was released last October. As the first title to debut a gorgeous new Call of Duty graphics engine, it’s assumed the fresh tech under the hood might be responsible for Modern Warfare’s excessive size. Since Call of Duty 2020 looks to be built on a similar framework, hopefully these size reduction techniques prove worthy in keeping space managable in the months ahead.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare is available now on PS4, Xbox One and PC.
Are you OK with Modern Warfare’s huge updates? What do you hope to see during Season 4? Tell us in the comments section!
