Apex Legends Season 4 landed yesterday and brings with it a cavalcade of fresh additions to Respawn’s free-to-play battle royale title, and it's more than just Revenant.
Skill-based matchmaking was a hot topic during Season 3 and has continued that into 4.
Skill Based Matchmaking In Season 4
Aside from the new character, there's a fresh map update, a wealth of meta-changes and a new weapon – all awaiting players that jump in, but many have been asking about the underlying matchmaking systems the game employs.
In late 2019, players began to complain about a lower win-rate as they seemed to be pitted against more experienced players – particularly having snagged decent-placed finishes in prior games.
If you’ve won a match, followed by a steady losing streak, that’s because Apex Legends uses skill-based matchmaking in all modes including both casual and ranked.
Despite players believing the system was added as a post-launch update, Respawn has reiterated that it’s been around for the last year (since launch), and is simply being tweaked as time goes on.
Read More: Apex Legends: Is Revenant Overpowered And Why Season 4's New Legend Needs To Be Nerfed
That includes Season 4’s update, with the developers confirming further tweaks being made:
“With this patch, we’ll be pushing out changes globally to matchmaking that we’ve been testing in specific regions,” the team noted.
“We’re well aware that this has been a contentious topic among players and there’s been some misinformation out there so just to be clear: skill-based matchmaking has existed in Apex since launch and we’ll be continuing to improve it over time.”
In any case, both casual and ranked modes look to be being tweaked as the season goes on.
If you’re wondering about what makes ranked mode different from playing casually with friends, we’ve put together this handy guide.