Treyarch appears to have responded to an early Call of Duty: Black Ops 4's post-launch controversy in response to community backlash. Reddit user soja92 reports that the Black Ops 4 multiplayer server-to-client tick rate has been upgraded from 20hz to 30hz, an unlisted detail in the October 23 patch notes. The faster communication between server and client will result in a crisper and more accurate Black Ops 4 multiplayer experience that will hopefully be quite apparent to dedicated players.
The server tick rate controversy grew in the community over the past week after it became widely known that Black Ops 4's multiplayer servers were running at a surprisingly low 20hz. In other words, the multiplayer servers were sending new information to the player 20 times a second. With Black Ops 4 targeting 60fps on console, a 20hz tick rate would result in the client being updated every 3 frames. While that's not an uncommon tick rate in competitive multiplayer games, a higher tick rate is oft requested in today's performance-savvy gaming climate.
Black Ops 4's client update tick rate by itself wasn't the heart of the controversy, though. The true controversy stems from the difference between Black Ops 4's multiplayer beta tick rate and launch. During the beta, the tick rate was a scorching 60hz, meaning Treyarch and Activision cut it by 60% for launch. Again, this isn't uncommon because the sheer number of players at launch often force studios to make compromises to maintain server integrity. The Black Ops 4 community, however, saw the beta misrepresentative of the final product.
Treyarch has been quick to respond to the Black Ops 4 community's vocal feedback, first discussing the issue in the game's October 21 update:
"We’re constantly working to optimize the game, and particularly network performance, to ensure the highest quality online experience for our players. For a game launch with as massive a population as ours hitting so many global servers at once, we configure our infrastructure to ensure game stability as the highest priority over all other factors."
The development team also promised that "over the next two weeks" several optimizations and improvements would be made to the game based on post-launch data. That first Black Ops 4 update came two days later, bumping up the tick rate to 30hz in "targeted locations." Treyarch will continue to monitor the state of Black Ops 4's multiplayer and make adjustments as necessary but wants to ensure stability before taking further significant steps forward.
More than anything, today's tick rate change will prove a symbolic effort by Treyarch to show the studio's recognition of the community's voice. A 20hz to 30hz change is significant but unlikely to be noticed by the majority of players without attention having been called to it. Just as important, however, will be the follow-up over the next few weeks. But it seems clear that Treyarch understands that very well.
Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 is available now on PC, PS4, and Xbox One.
Source: Reddit