Okay, so I’m well aware of what this is going to sound like and I’m absolutely 100% fine with that.
I call bs on games having randomized matchmaking.
Or even matchmaking that only pairs you with similar skilled players.
Get out those tin-foil hats because here comes my conspiracy theory.
ONLINE GAMES NOW MATCHMAKE YOUR GAMES TO INFLUENCE YOUR BEHAVIOR!
Hear me out.
Whenever you put down a game for a while then come back to it, suddenly you get matched with competent teams while the other team is packed full of bricks.
Then you play it for a while and the games get harder and harder.
And after a little bit of a bender you’re suddenly plopped onto teams with players who are toxic, players that have no idea what they’re doing, or players that simply don’t care. Meanwhile on the other team you’re recognizing some names off of ESPN.
All the meanwhile, the fun of the game is being sucked out because games are seldom a fair fight and you’re always on either the winning side or the losing side of a one way fight.
I’ve been suspicious of some games doing this in the past, but I’m down right POSITIVE that Smite does this.
I’ve actually reviewed some my history and can see a clear correlation between likelihood of winning and length of time in between play sessions. And my KDA is often completely irrelevant.
So, am I crazy here?
Or are online games thinking they’re slicker than they actually are?
I’ve noticed the same thing. Player retention is the end-all-be-all of online games these days and game designers know how to manipulate your behavior. I wouldn’t be surprised in the slightest if an algorithm predetermined the outcome of matches. It wouldn’t be a particularly hard thing to code.
I think it’s much more important for any matchmaking system to match with something so any scheme will first and foremost prioritise a populated multiplayer game.
You might just be being matched with anything in order to ensure something is better than nothing, which should correlate with the time of day (not many people online in the small hours etc).
I’m using Smite as an example because it’s the only multiplayer game I’ve played in years, and they don’t ever have an issue with populating a match, but I would imagine that a lot of less popular titles would have this issue.
I can’t imagine Battleborn would have such luxuries.
I recently starting playing Clash Royale over Christmas break as a few of my friends are into it. Anyways I did notice that the matchmaking seemed a little bit off, especially after playing my friend’s account. But, considering the fact that Supercell is a big company and has alot to invest in the game I definitely think its plausible. I found that I quickly (2-3 days) gained around 2000 trophies. However, the games started getting really hard, to the point that getting better took alot (about 2 weeks) to gain even 200 more. Nothing abnormal here, just a steep jump in the difficulty curve. However, the odd part is when I have played with my friend’s account (I wanted to try out his cards) who started at the same time as me I started winning really fast and got to around 2300 without any problems (from 2000). The only difference I could find in our accounts is he paid money to get some extra cards. Perhaps I just got lucky with easy opponents, but it does seem a bit off.