Michael Condrey claims Activision dictates matchmaking systems in Call of Duty games
Michael Condrey has chimed on the debate regarding skill based matchmaking in Call of Duty games, amongst other topics.
A user tweeted at Condrey linking our article on Nadeshot’s comments regarding why SBMM is used in Call of Duty games, and there’s no ranked play.
Twitter user said to ‘ask @MichaelCondrey’ why SBMM is terrible when he had it in Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare in 2014, which sparked a major debate in the Call of Duty community on matchmaking during those days. SHGames went as far as to comment on it by saying their games are ping focused first, but data showed SBMM was strong.
In a reply to the comment, Condrey says “Ask ATVI. Never directed into COD from me,” claiming the entire matchmaking system is handled by the Activision production team. He also said microtransactions, dedicated server coverage, and all are handled by Activision only.
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Ask ATVI. Never directed into COD from me. Analytics, SB match making, monetization, dedi server coverage, etc all driven from ATVI central tech and production teams. Fustratingly little influence on those corp decisions despite their impact on our games and the COD community.
— Michael Condrey (@MichaelCondrey) March 27, 2020
He says that devs have “frustratingly little influence on those decisions” and that they could not control the changes despite COD community feedback on those issues.
Skill based matchmaking has been a big topic of conversation in Call of Duty community this year with Modern Warfare, as many users believe the game has higher SBMM compared to previous Call of Duty titles.
Condrey left Sledgehammer Games 2018 and has since started a new studio for 2K Games in Silicon Valley.