The Haunting event in Season 6 of Warzone brings a spooky twist to the game with the Purgatory mode.
In this mode, ten squads of four fight on a scary version of Rebirth Island, called Hellspawn. The map looks like a nightmare with a creepy sky, red water, zombie NPCs, and walls that seem alive.
At first, you might wonder what to do in Purgatory since there’s no main goal. You have custom loadouts and unlimited respawns, making it great for hanging out with friends, chatting, and completing challenges. It’s perfect for finishing your camo grind or knocking out seasonal objectives.
Purgatory has some wild new features, like magical ball-shaped portals for teleporting and giant killer balls called “Terriballs” that can crush enemies. You can even fly the Shipment multiplayer map like a helicopter, which is as silly as it sounds but super fun.
We think it’s hilarious to see someone flying Shipment doing loops in the sky.
The mix of new mechanics makes Purgatory quirky and fun. Sometimes, you and an enemy might race for the same Terriball, leading to a funny scramble. Some matches are intense, with players hunting you down, while others are more relaxed, with players teaming up using in-game chat.
Your Torment level, shown as a meter with five skulls under the minimap, goes up with more kills. Higher Torment levels give you more XP but also make the game harder. If you reach Level 5, you get marked on the map, and a chopper comes after you. You can lose your Torment level by dying or entering a safe zone, which can be a strategy to lower the heat on you.
The two-hour match timer in Purgatory can be tough to commit to, and there’s no way to leave early without losing XP, though I didn’t get a warning when I had to leave a match. It would be nice to have a way to exit early or an optional game-ending objective.
Some players report matches ending with a nuke animation before the timer runs out, though I haven’t seen this myself. There’s no sign of a hidden nuke challenge either.
A small gripe is that all contracts on the map are the usual Warzone ones. It would have been cool to see Halloween-themed contracts, like zombie-killing tasks or special bounty contracts for unique zombie types from the Zombies mode.
Despite its flaws, I’ve enjoyed racking up XP in Purgatory since Season 6 started. A sandbox mode like this would be great to keep around for completing challenges, especially for players who don’t buy every yearly Call of Duty game. It doesn’t have to stay on the Hellspawn variant of Rebirth Island; it could work on larger maps like Urzikstan too.
The Haunting event runs until October 16, and I highly recommend trying Purgatory for a spooky, fun way to level up and finish challenges. You can earn some cool rewards, like animated weapon camos.
This is the last season of Modern Warfare 3, with Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 launching on October 25 for Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, and PC.
