Activision says 'Arc Raiders' censorship in Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 lobbies was unintentional and will be fixed

Black Ops 7 defusal — (Image credit: Activision)

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Update: Activision says the block of "Arc Raiders" in Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 beta test lobbies was the result of text filter error. How exactly a mistake of that very specific nature happened was not shared, but the company said the error will be fixed soon, and may well be by the time you read this. Original story follows.

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 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.

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Rich is a games journalist with 15 years' experience, beginning his career on Edge magazine before working for a wide range of outlets, including Ars Technica, Eurogamer, GamesRadar+, Gamespot, the Guardian, IGN, the New Statesman, Polygon, and Vice. He was the editor of Kotaku UK, the UK arm of Kotaku, for three years before joining PC Gamer. He is the author of a Brief History of Video Games, a full history of the medium, which the Midwest Book Review described as "[a] must-read for serious minded game historians and curious video game connoisseurs alike."

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