Call of Duty has brought matchmaking back into the conversation. Activision has announced that Black Ops 7 is introducing a new matchmaking system, available to players today with the launch of Season 5.
“Over the past year, we’ve continued to learn a lot about multiplayer matchmaking through player data and community feedback,” the announcement said. “We’re also excited to see all the recent love for Black Ops and Black Ops 2, which reinforced that there are many elements of those experiences that players appreciate.”
As such, Black Ops 7’s new matchmaking system is “inspired by” the recently released PlayStation ports of Black Ops 1 and 2 and will be available across the Quick Play, Party Games and – quite fittingly – the Black Ops Classic playlists.
Black Ops 7, of course, already has two different matchmaking systems. In the lead-up to its release, developer Treyarch announced a new Open matchmaking system alongside the standard version. At the time, it said Open takes “minimal skill consideration” into account, which was a response to years of certain sections of the Call of Duty community decrying the standard system – what they’ve been referring to as Skill-based Matchmaking (SBMM), where presumably skill has been more strictly prioritised.
Both options have been available in Black Ops 7 since launch, and they each cover the same modes. In other words, you could opt for Team Deathmatch in the standard playlist or the Open. So what sets this new matchmaking apart from Open? Activision didn’t say, though we’ve reached out to ask.
The same announcement also confirmed August’s Modern Warfare 4 beta will continue the now-tradition of offering Open and standard matchmaking, which presumably means the final version will too.
Although the Black Ops 1&2 ports have drawn plenty of criticisms; chiefly for how little they offer in terms of upgrades given how much they cost, they did reignite the conversation about the divide between fans of the classic, far less movement-focused COD and those who are happy with the modern-era games.
The news follows weeks of positive sentiments about BO7, after Treyarch made the (also) BO1&2-inspired Classic mode a permanent addition, which had many – myself included – arguing for its return in Modern Warfare 4.
