Rahul Sood, founder of Voodoo PC, claimed that years ago, PC players armed with the precision and speed of a mouse and keyboard routinely "destroyed" (open in new tab) console players equipped with controllers, so Microsoft once claimed that early experiments with cross-play were abruptly abandoned. Things have since changed dramatically with the advent of Aim Assist, to the point where some "Modern Warfare 2" players on PC now complain that they are too overwhelmed by console players.

Recently, a number of threads have been started on the Modern Warfare 2 subreddit, many of them claiming that Aim Assist is grossly excessive and, in some opinions, completely broken, accompanied by videos proving their claims. There are even complaints that the aim assist tracks the target through smoke and fire when the enemy target is partially hidden.

"The current Aim Assist is very easy to abuse for those who understand it," writes redditor eaeb4 (opens in new tab).

"The redditor eaeb4 (opens tab) writes:" They need to revert it back to what it is supposed to do (i.e. slowing down when tracking an enemy).

"In a gunfight in MW2019, if the other team was a console player with a pistol, we knew we would probably lose," replied foxlance (opens in new tab).

"Aim assist makes pistols so much easier than a mouse and keyboard.

"On a PC, you would usually have to abandon your ethics, pay a monthly subscription, and be willing to dodge anti-cheats to get an Aimbot like this," wrote OsmeOxys (opens in a new tab).

Of course, not everyone thinks so: many others say the claims about AimAssist are dramatically exaggerated.

"There are no bugs at all, nowhere near what some people like to claim," bockscar888 (open in new tab) said in another thread." It is some KBM players who are overly invested in the kopium of the game. Not all KBM players are over-invested, they are just doing it for fun like 90% of the people who play.

Some console players are also having a little fun with the reversal of positions against the mouse and keyboard:

Of course, there are those who say that those who have not experienced OP Aim Assist just don't know how to set it up properly and that Aim Assist is not really overpowered Some deny the claim that Modern Warfare 2's Aim Assist is not a simple toggle: as you can see in the screen below, there are four different types of Aim Assist (Default, Precision, Focusing, and Black Ops), as well as different Aim Response Curves and ADS ( Aim Down Sight) sensitivity transition timing, and other adjustment options.

We asked staff writer and CoD player Morgan Park for his take on all of this:

"As a KBM player, I go back and forth on the power of Aim Assist. While it can seem overpowered in some scenarios, such as extreme close combat where the PC player's mouse reflexes are truly tested, the Aim-Assisted player seems to do most of the work. But the Aim-Assist player seems to do most of the work; I've never experienced the magical long-range tracking that the Reddit clip describes, nor have I adjusted the Aim-Assist slider when playing with a controller. All I know is that, in the end, using a mouse makes me very competitive. Aim Assist may be unfair on paper, but the proof is in the scoreboard.

What makes the Modern Warfare 2 situation particularly interesting is the contrast with Overwatch 2, which, despite what you may think, is Activision's other big shooter. It was announced in October (though it had been previously announced) that "Overwatch 2" will automatically turn off (open in a new tab) the controller's aiming assist when playing against PC gamers.

Meanwhile, players playing "Modern Warfare 2" on PC and Xbox cannot disable cross-play (opens in a new tab), making it virtually impossible to avoid playing against controller-equipped (and aim-assisted) players. Quite the opposite of Blizzard's approach. (To make it even more bizarre and frustrating, PlayStation 5 owners can disable cross-play.) Activision has yet to comment on this disparity.)

Some "Modern Warfare 2" players say the solution is to implement input-based cross-play, where players are matched based on their control settings: mouse vs. mouse, controller vs. controller; in "Halo Infinite" (open in new tab) input based matchmaking is supported to a limited extent, but only in "Ranked Solo/Duos". Interestingly, the original "Modern Warfare" reboot was supposed to support it, but ultimately did not, although it is possible that Infinity Ward will add input-based matchmaking to "Modern Warfare 2" in the future, there is no indication of this at this time.

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