Yesterday, on October 8th, the beta test for the new Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War began, and the first reactions are not particularly positive. The CoD experts Drift0r and TheXclusiveAce both even ended their streams.
What was going on? Since yesterday evening (October 8 – 7:00 PM), players who pre-ordered on PS4 can join the beta test of Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War. After heavy criticism during the alpha test a few weeks ago, it seems that this is now being repeated in the beta.
Many players had problems yesterday and could not enjoy the game at all. Two major CoD experts and YouTubers even ended their streams on Twitch because they weren’t having fun.
One of them, “Drift0r,” already released a video about the beta and said the current version is “overwhelmingly negative.” The other, “TheXclusiveAce,” tried it twice and ended both times on a negative note: “I am not having fun.”
Beta improves some things over Alpha, but has new problems
Where are the problems? Four points of criticism keep surfacing in the reports:
- Strong Skill-Based Matchmaking (SBMM)
- Poor lobby connections
- Frame drops in matches
- Disbanding lobbies after the game
What about the SBMM? Many players say that the SBMM in the beta is quite severe. This means that even a little good gameplay can land you in a lobby with sweats and tough opponents. Already in CoD MW, the seemingly strict matching of lobbies based on skills was a huge problem for many CoD soldiers. They rather wish for a ranked mode where strong players can go all out and a normal matchmaking system where performance variables like ping or good server connections play a bigger role.
Under the tweet of the official CoD account regarding the beta, there are numerous demands to completely remove the SBMM:
What about the lobbies? What particularly burdened both CoD experts were the poor lobbies. In every game of both, there were connection issues. This led to ghost bullets that did not hit or “super bullets” that hit twice. This could be due to the netcode that regulates the information exchange between player and server.
It can also happen that you are already hiding behind cover on your screen, but the opponent can still land the decisive shots. Drift0r also shows this in his feedback video (at 3:20 minutes):
Ace described it in his stream: “It’s like fast-forwarding a YouTube video, but instead of skipping directly to the point, it plays back the skipped part quickly, and the voices sound like the Chipmunks.”
What about the frame rate? Another point that affected the fun of some players were frame drops on the PlayStation 4 – also on the PS4 Pro. Again and again the frame rate dropped briefly for both Drift0r and Ace, which made playing quite exhausting at times.
What about the disbanding lobbies? Another point of criticism that many in the community have pointed out is the lobbies that disband after the game (via CharlieIntel). That getting completely new teammates after a match was already a major topic of contention in CoD MW. With the alpha of Cold War, the lobbies remained intact so that players could play multiple rounds against the same players. However, many players experienced in the beta that the lobby is completely reassembled after the match – contrary to the wishes of many players.
Personal conclusion: Partially different experiences
Could this be due to the beta stage? That is currently the big question, and it could be answered with a “yes.”
Because my own experiences with the beta yesterday were somewhat different. I had neither big problems with overly sweaty opponents, nor did my lobbies disband after the match. I could also observe some minor performance issues, but not as severe frame drops as those reported by the experts.
The lobbies were also more stable, and even though I noticed that in some deaths I was already well behind cover on my screen – it didn’t seem as bad as it was for Drift0r and Ace.
This could be related to different server regions and loads. But these are not really good signs when the servers are already having issues and it’s only the closed beta for pre-orders on PS4.
Beta better than Alpha in many respects – But not in the important ones
Is there anything good about the beta? Drift0r also mentions some positive adjustments and quality-of-life changes that make playing more pleasant:
- The movement feels better than in the alpha – Here he only sees the problem with lags
- Wide range of controller settings
- Field of view settings on the PS4
- HUD can be extensively customized
- Very detailed display of weapon stats
- Weapon recoil feels better
- Better balancing than in the alpha (overpowered sniper nerfed)
However, his final comment clearly leans towards the negative. The numerous problems outweigh the improvements, and he did not have a good time during his first tests of the beta. While some of the biggest alpha problems were resolved, new ones have arisen that in some cases made it even worse.
MyMMO has actually spoken with Treyarch regarding this, and they named us the 3 most important changes to the alpha.
The beta is running in 4 phases, and several changes and new content are expected before testing ends on October 19. You can find out what content the beta delivers and when non-pre-order players and other platforms will join in our big special on the Cold War Beta.
