Does Call of Duty have room for casual players anymore? Players throw questions about SBMM in the game

Call of Duty has come a long way since its release in 2003. The game has evolved with time and is probably the most popular FPS franchise in the world.

While the gaming franchise started with its traditional single-player campaign experience, Call of Duty's multiplayer has become the center of attraction over time. Since the release of Warzone in 2020, this multiplayer experience is now bigger than ever.

On the primary map of Warzone, 150 players hop on and fight till the last man/team remains. Without a shred of doubt, this game is one of the most competitive multiplayer battle royale games available on the market.

As the game gained more popularity, many players joined the community. While all these players grind every single day and try to be the best in the game, the question arises: does Call of Duty have any more room left for casual players?

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Casual players are not happy with Call of Duty anymore

Activision has repeatedly claimed that they have added SBMM (Skill-based Matchmaking) with Warzone at launch. SBMM is an algorithm that decides a player's strength based on their previous matches and puts them into lobbies where they'd face players of equal strength. However, fans have experienced multiple discrepancies from the said SBMM algorithm in the game.

Since the game's popularity has skyrocketed, Twitch streamers, Tiktokers, YouTubers, and everyone is jumping onto Call of Duty Warzone, and the game's mechanics have changed since its release in 2020.

A Redditor posted a thread saying,

"Feels like every lobby I get put into there's a bunch of [TTV] [tktok] sweaters off 3 scoops of G-Fuel stim gliding around every corner auto locking onto headshots like they’re in a 100k tourney and this win depends on it. Don’t get me wrong I get lobbies where I have fun but I feel like you have to go into every fight fully locked in and expecting to go against some twitch streamer trying their nuts off for their 6 viewers."

Furthermore, the Redditor points out some more problems regarding the game, which allows casual players who want to have fun with their friends at the end of the day to be at a huge disadvantage.

The weapon balancing in the game is a bit shaky due to its constant meta shifting. Players need to grind and level up their current metas to compete with other regular players. So, for casual players, this can be bothersome.

All Warzone pros and regular players use advanced movement mechanisms like Slide Canceling and Bunny Hop to gain an in-game advantage, which creates a huge skill gap. A Redditor also said,

"You have to get a PC for FOV and back paddles for your controller or put yourself at a disadvantage."

Players have also accused the game multiple times of putting them into lobbies, which have a higher overall KD than the player itself.

The skill gap in Warzone and other Call of Duty titles makes it difficult for casual players to come and play the game. Users are hoping Activision will look into the issue and make changes accordingly in the next iteration of Modern Warfare 2 and Warzone 2.

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Disclaimer: This article reflects the opinions of the writer.