If you never get an easy opponent in XDefiant, you're the easy opponent, suggests producer

GamesFPSXDefiantIf you never get an easy opponent in XDefiant, you’re the easy opponent, suggests producerWhen you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.

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(Image credit: Ubisoft)

xdefiant

A somewhat unusual feature of XDefiant is the absence of skill-based matchmaking in its casual playlists (except one introductory playlist). That means that, unlike many of today’s other competitive multiplayer games, the new free-to-play shooter doesn’t try to put you into matches with similarly-skilled players unless you’re playing ranked, so you should face the full spectrum of skill levels, from beginners to MLG pro types.

It follows, then, that if it always feels like you’re the least-skilled player in your matches, it just might be that you’re one of the least-skilled players overall—sorry to say!

(Image credit: Mark Rubin)

XDefiant executive producer Mark Rubin didn’t directly say as much, but made the point when he replied “This!” to a comment from YouTuber Xclusive Ace, whopointed out on Xthat “if you literally never find easy enemies, that’s just a sign that you’ve got a lot of room for improvement.”

“That’s about the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard,” the producertold one playerwho accused him of putting “some kind of script” in XDefiant that somehow makes certain players harder to kill.

I like that Rubin doesn’t validate every emotion or criticism directed at him and XDefiant. Hethinks the map spawns are good, not bad, for example; I don’t really have an opinion on the spawns myself, it just seems like a good sign when a game’s lead is willing to express strong feelings about what does and doesn’t work rather than issuing blanket ‘we’re listening’ statements in response to every criticism. At the same time as he’s acknowledging valid complaints about XDefiant, Rubin’s beencomplaining right back about players.

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I’ve definitely had a bad enough time in a shooter that I was coming up with theories of my own—it’s extremely demoralizing when it suddenly feels like all your opponents are John Wick—but it’s funny that SBMM still manages to take heat in a game that mostly avoids it.

Despite never being matched with easy opponents myself—which surely doesn’t mean anything about my skill level—I’ve been enjoying XDefiant, and Jakehas also had fun with it.

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