Black Ops 4 emotes let you see around corners, Treyarch plans to tackle the problem

Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 came out yesterday (you can check out Steven's review in progress here), and players are already finding ways to manipulate the game's systems to gain an advantage over other players. Specifically, if you use a third-person emote, the camera will pull back and rotate at will, allowing you to peek around corners. It could prove especially useful in the battle royale Blackout mode, letting you see far-off players while hiding behind a tree.

Developer Treyarch has been quick to respond. In a Reddit post detailing day one bug fixes and planned changes, it said that it was "aware that players have been able to use Gestures (often referred to by the community as 'Emotes') to peek around corners in modes where that can create an unfair advantage". The planned fix will create a new system that "disables free look and applies different camera settings" for emotes in competitive game modes, the developer said.

The current system for emotes will continue to be used elsewhere in the game "where corner peeking won’t affect gameplay balance", such as in the pre-game lobby for rounds of Blackout, it added.

I'm surprised the problem wasn't caught in pre-release testing, but at least it's getting fixed sharpish.

Thanks, Eurogamer.

Samuel is a freelance journalist and editor who first wrote for PC Gamer nearly a decade ago. Since then he's had stints as a VR specialist, mouse reviewer, and previewer of promising indie games, and is now regularly writing about Fortnite. What he loves most is longer form, interview-led reporting, whether that's Ken Levine on the one phone call that saved his studio, Tim Schafer on a milkman joke that inspired Psychonauts' best level, or historians on what Anno 1800 gets wrong about colonialism. He's based in London.