Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 release sees UK's biggest-ever gaming traffic for internet service providers
It's shot up, you could say.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 released today, and it is pulling in some serious numbers for many internet service providers.
According to EE, BT and Virgin Media O2, the game's launch and pre-load period has seen record traffic across each of the networks.
In a new press release, Virgin Media O2 stated on Wednesday 8th November, when the game was available to pre-load, its broadband network "hit 25.1Tbps at peak (8-10pm)".
The company noted Modern Warfare 3's spike was "a 22 percent increase on the peak traffic seen during this last week's return of Fortnite's original map" (as a quick reminder, Virgin Media is specifically talking about UK traffic here).
It's also worth noting that while there was more traffic for Modern Warfare 3, the file sizes for the Call of Duty sequel are a lot higher, contributing to the high data counts. That may explain the high internet usage in comparison to Fortnite's recent record numbers of concurrent players.
Meanwhile, in a separate press release, EE said its own Modern Warfare 3-related network peak "highlighted one of the highest traffic to customer ratios". This, it said, indicated that a large number of gamers were using the network.
It went on to state this spike (which like Virgin was also recorded since Wednesday) was the "biggest single game contribution to a broadband peak" for both EE and BT broadband.
It marked the second highest overall peak for the companies. The only other date to see higher traffic for EE and BT was earlier this year, on 15th February. No, this wasn't because of some strange Valentine's Day hangover. Rather, it was predominantly thanks to football. This date apparently saw the combined efforts of a Premier League "clash" between Arsenal and Man City, which was broadcast online, as well as multiple Champions League fixtures and the Call of Duty: Warzone Season 2 update boosting traffic.
But while today's Call of Duty release may be popular in terms of internet traffic, it hasn't exactly had a great reception from critics and users. As our Ed reported earlier today, Activision has claimed its Call of Duty HQ launcher provides easier file management and seamless switching between games. However, it has received a fair amount of criticism from players.
Meanwhile, our Chris Tapsell called the game's campaign "vapid and hastily assembled" in Eurogamer's Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 review. Hastily assembled is a spot-on observation by Chris, as it was recently reported that Modern Warfare 3 was developed in just 16 months.