Former Call of Duty Dev Casts Doubt on Activision's SBMM Claims

An ex-Call of Duty dev has called bullsh-t on Activision's SBMM statement.

By Cade Onder

A former Call of Duty developer doesn't think Activision is telling the full story when it comes to the skill-based matchmaking situation. Call of Duty is one of the biggest multiplayer games on the planet across the multiplayer in its mainline entries and its free-to-play spin-off, Call of Duty: Warzone. It's a game that lives or dies by its players and for the last few years, some players have felt like the game has been actively working against them and giving them a more difficult experience. Some feel the skill-based matchmaking (or SBMM) has been broken and led to players being matched against people who are too "sweaty" and require too much effort to play against, resulting in an unfair and exhausting experience.

After years of asking for change, Activision promised in December it would create a transparent line of communication with fans to explain how its SBMM works in Call of Duty. After weeks of silence, we finally got some answers and insight into the matter and Activision noted it doesn't have any plans to overhaul the SBMM in Call of Duty anytime soon. It was also noted that skill-based matchmaking has been around for games that Call of Duty fans claim to be the golden age of the series. A blog post stated that Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare was the first game to have SBMM in the franchise and it has been there ever since. However, an ex-Call of Duty developer named Brian Bright responded to this claim with a bull emoji and a poop emoji, calling bullsh-t on these claims. We're not sure what specifically Bright is calling out, but former Call of Duty developer Josh Menke stated in 2021 that Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare did in fact have skill-based matchmaking as well.

It's possible the extent of it is different and Bright is suggesting it's not comparable, but his comments remain unexplained. In reality, we are probably never going to know the 100% truth to how Call of Duty's skill-based matchmaking works. It's very complex and even if they were to tell us everything, players would still probably claim it's nonsense. Either way, it's all a very fascinating story and is interesting to see Activision try its best to explain the process.

0comments

Related:

Start the Conversation

of