Black Ops 2 PC To Ship With Ranked Dedicated Server Support

Over the past several Call of Duty releases, PC gamers have been left feeling disappointed by the lack of dedicated servers. Modern Warfare 3 had dedicated servers, sure, but they were limited to unranked games only, which doesn’t quite cut it for some.

In Black Ops 2, that’s set to change.

Cesar Stastny, Treyarch’s director of technology, confirmed in a tweet over the weekend that Black Ops 2 will have dedicated server support, and this time around ranked will be supported. “Confirmed: Ranked Dedicated Servers for ?#BlackOps2,” Stastny wrote.

For some reason or another, Activision has been a bit off-and-on when it comes to dedicated server support for Call of Duty games on the PC platform. The original Black Ops supported dedicated servers, but only from one provider. Modern Warfare 2, arguably the best title to date, shipped with no dedicated server support at all.

With Modern Warfare 2, Activision and Infinity Ward wanted to push its so-called “IWNet” multiplayer system on the PC, rather than going the dedicated server route. Infinity Ward’s Robert Bowling had this to say in IWNet’s defense at the time:

“The biggest benefit of using IWnet by far is the fact that you don’t have to worry about joining a server full of aim-bots, wallhacks, or cheaters,” Bowling writes. “Or relying on the server admin of the server to constantly be monitoring, banning, and policing it.”

Is the lack of dedicated servers in a PC title, such as Black Ops 2, a dealbreaker for you?