"New Console-Only Crossplay Option Penalizes Non-Cheating PC Players in Call of Duty"

With the launch of Season 3 this week, Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 and Warzone are set to undergo a significant update that has sparked concern among the PC gaming community regarding potential impacts on matchmaking queue times.

Activision released the Season 3 patch notes, confirming a major adjustment to regular Multiplayer. The update separates the settings for Multiplayer Ranked Play and Call of Duty: Warzone Ranked Play and introduces a new Multiplayer-only setting for Quickplay, Featured, and Party Games matches.

Starting April 4, when Season 3 goes live, players will have the following crossplay options across three different settings (Multiplayer Ranked Play, Call of Duty: Warzone Ranked Play, and Multiplayer Unranked):

• On: Allows matchmaking with all gaming platforms within the selected playlists.
• On (Consoles Only): Limits matchmaking to other console players within the selected playlists.
• Off: Restricts matchmaking to only your current gaming platform within the selected playlists.

Activision has cautioned that selecting On (Consoles Only) may lead to longer matchmaking queue times, while choosing Off will almost certainly result in longer waits.

The introduction of console-only crossplay in regular Multiplayer has raised alarms within the Call of Duty PC community. Many PC players fear that if console players opt out of crossplay to avoid PC cheaters, it could lead to increased queue times for them. Call of Duty has faced issues with cheating, particularly on PC, a fact that Activision has acknowledged. This has led some console players to disable crossplay to avoid encounters with cheaters.

PC players have expressed their concerns on social media. Redditor exjr_ stated, "As a PC player... hate this change but I get it. I hope it doesn't affect queue times for the game in the long-run so I'm not forced to buy the game on PS5 to have a good experience." Another user, @GKeepnclassy on X/Twitter, lamented, "This is awful for PC players because this just killed PC. Terrible idea because now PC players that ARE NOT cheating are being penalized. This is bullshit." @CBBMack added, "My lobbies barely fill already to begin with on PC due to sbmm. This will without a doubt make it worse. Time to plug in the console I guess."

Some PC players have suggested that Activision should focus on improving its anti-cheat system rather than isolating PC players. Redditor MailConsistent1344 commented, "Maybe they should fix their anti-cheat instead of isolating PC players."

Activision has invested heavily in combating cheating, with recent successes in shutting down major cheat providers such as Phantom Overlay. Despite these efforts, the battle against cheating remains challenging. With Season 3, Activision promises enhanced anti-cheat technology, which will be crucial to observe, especially with the anticipated return of Verdansk to Warzone.

However, many in the console community may not even be aware of these new settings. As noted by Call of Duty YouTuber TheXclusiveAce, the majority of casual console players may not delve into patch notes or settings adjustments. They typically play unranked Multiplayer for a short duration and might not notice the option for console-only crossplay or understand its purpose.

TheXclusiveAce addressed PC players' concerns, stating, "I see a lot of pushback with this change from PC players concerned that they won't be able to find games in lesser played modes or that matchmaking will take too long. To be clear, PC players will still be matchmaking with the largest pool of the playerbase since that majority of players won't even notice this setting exists so they'll stick to the default or even if they are aware of it, many will choose to leave it on. If anything, it's the players that decide to turn console-only crossplay on that will be limiting their matchmaking pool but that's a choice that's now in their hands for the first time in Pubs and it's a tradeoff that many of us will be happy to make."

As Season 3 approaches for Black Ops 6 and Warzone, it will be interesting to see if these changes have a significant impact on the game's community and how effective Activision's ongoing efforts against cheating will be.