Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 is currently in an early access beta period, with the full release slated for 14 November. Activision's annualised treadmill is such a feature of the landscape now you forget it ever had serious competition, though this year EA's taking yet another crack at it with Battlefield 6.
The game that seems to worry Activision, though? Going by the chat function in Black Ops 7, it's Arc Raiders (due out on October 30).
The words "Arc Raiders" are censored in Black Ops 7 chat. PCG's Elie Gould tested it out, and when you try to type those words you just get a load of asterisks. Neither "Arc" nor "Raiders" is picked up like this, only the two words together.
Now, there is one kink worth considering here before we all get the pitchforks out. Several months ago users reported a similar problem in the EA App chat. First of all it's surprising that anyone used chat in the EA App, but the situation here was exactly the same. Once this was noticed EA seemed to move quickly to correct the situation, and players could happily chat about Arc Raiders on the EA App from 6 August.
EA obviously has Battlefield 6 launching this Friday, so in both cases these companies have direct competitors to Arc Raiders. It's tempting to fetch the tinfoil hat, but another possible explanation is that both companies are using some sort of third party software to help moderate their various chats, and that software has Arc Raiders on the blacklist for whatever reason.
Arc raiders being censored in the black ops 7 beta lol from r/ArcRaiders
Outside of this, Black Ops 7 seems to be delivering what the COD fans want: not least by dipping a toe into offering a playlist without skill-based matchmaking, a major bugbear for some. Activision is also bragging that Ricochet, its dedicated anti-cheat software, is now detecting 97% of cheaters and banning them within 30 minutes of their first sign-in.
Meanwhile, whatever the explanation for this, I'm sure the champagne corks are popping at Arc Raiders developer Embark Studios: You couldn't buy this kind of publicity.
