Activision has released the results of a study confirming the necessity of skill-based matchmaking (SBMM) systems in games. Analysts claim that disabling these restrictions would lead to a player exodus.

The topic of SBMM concerns many communities, but the loudest complaints come from fans of Call of Duty and Apex Legends. The system always tries to gather players into a lobby so that each team's chances of winning are about 50%. What’s bad about that? To explain quickly and simply: the more impressive your individual skills (number of kills, win streaks, etc.), the higher the chances the system will place you with inexperienced newcomers. And you'll have to carry the team yourself.

It seems Activision decided to practically test whether SBMM is as harmful as players and bloggers claim. In early 2024, the developers of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III secretly divided all North American players into two halves. In the first group, SBMM was weakened, making player selection less dependent on skills, while in the second group, the system was left unchanged.

The results confirmed the fears of Activision managers. About 10% of players in the test group started returning to MWIII more often over two weeks. These were the very experienced gamers who started winning more due to their personal skills. But what about the remaining 90% of players? They started launching the shooter less frequently.

At the same time, there might be some questions to methodology of such an experiment. Considering that developers can't be called unbiased, sometimes it is not about the data itself but how you interpret the data.

With the current state of game, the main idea is clear. Just play casual modes... casually without thinking of the result and grind factors. Like one hockey player said: "It's only a game, why you heff to be mad?"

Main image: alphacoders.com

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