Title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War
Type of Game: First-Person Shooter (FPS)
Developer: Treyarch, Raven Software
Publisher: Activision
Released: November 13, 2020
Platforms Available: PlayStation 4, Xbox, PC Game
Platform Reviewed: PlayStation 4
Level of Maturity: Mature (M)
Reading Time: 10 minutes
Let’s be clear from the start: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War, the 2020 installment of the famous FPS series, is derivative. It’s an amalgamation of something we’ve already seen, both in story campaigns and multiplayer. Except that, while the campaign fundamentally suffers from this, the multiplayer game can effectively entertain anyone who’s comfortable with an M-16 assault rifle in their hand.
A Campaign Lost in Time
The campaign doesn’t work for a simple reason: It tries too hard to emulate the solid story of the original Call of Duty: Black Ops, but it doesn’t have the script, the characters, the graphics, the sets, the length, or the ideas to do so. All it has is a Cold War setting and a pretty interesting ending, which is by no means enough for a positive rating.
Once again, there’s conspiracy upon a conspiracy, double agents threatening to blow up all of Europe, you’re shooting Islamists in Amsterdam, Russian agents in Miami, and a bunch of other people in a bunch of other illogical places. And of course, the Soviets and Americans are trying to brainwash each other’s enemy spies with strange methods and implant false memories. You were guided through the original Black Ops by the brilliant Reznov and the charismatic, if wild, Mason. Here, the protagonist is mute and Russell Adler, your direct superior agent, is so overly gruff, American, and boring that he comes across as a parody of himself.
Unmemorable Moments
In the original Black Ops, you went through memorable scenes – the Vorkuta uprising, the attack on the chemical weapons factory, the massacre of the poor Soviets after World War II, all moments that have stayed with players for over a decade. Cold War has literally not one such moment. Probably the closest thing to it is the infiltration of the KGB headquarters in Lubyanka, where an oppressively overly suspicious atmosphere reigns at times, but again, it’s just a cheap copy of the far better sequence that was spying on the Germans in Paris in Call of Duty: WWII. For the rest of the time, the game tries to wow you with breathtaking events, like a plane blowing up next to you. Or a helicopter, a car, or a rocket-propelled grenade.
Explosions Galore
Explosions are such an intimate part of everyday reality for members of the CIA that Adler and the others would feel uncomfortable if they didn’t mix a live hand grenade into their müsli every morning. Moreover, the campaign is unusually short, a few missions and it’s over. The authors “cleverly” try to stretch out the game time with two side missions, for which you have to solve puzzles to complete correctly, and clues to these puzzles are scattered throughout the other missions. So you might happen to shoot some Russians somewhere, return to base, and find that you’ve missed a tape recorder or diary. And you can restart the mission if you want the best possible ending to the story.
Yes, there are two possible endings here, which deserve cautious praise. The story choices through dialogue usually don’t have much effect and, all in all, feel quite redundant, but the last one, the crucial one, radically affects the shape of the final mission and the tone of the whole narrative. Exceptionally, when the Cold War doesn’t exactly give away all of its ancestors, it can obviously deliver (the only) really nice novelty.
Multiplayer Mayhem
The multiplayer also tries firing some new bullets, but they aim pretty far off target. The old, time-tested bullets, on the other hand, hit with deadly accuracy. It’s a fast, snappy arcade game where you kill quickly, get killed quickly, and respawn quickly, but you don’t have to worry about any complex tactics, and you get a nice play with some great 80s weapons. The strength of Cold War’s multiplayer lies in Team Deathmatch, in Domination, in other modes where you don’t wait for respawn and just get swept up in the frantic rhythm of continuous combat. You grab a good old M-16, sigh at how much fun it is to shoot bursts instead of full-auto for once, switch to a pump shotgun, clear an entire corridor of enemies with two shots, and finally send a napalm strike on their spawn.
Map Madness
Conversely, I’m not too fond of Search and Destroy or the new VIP Escort mode, where you protect one member of your team, suddenly armed only with a pistol and chased by an aggressive opponent. While it’s possible to pick up fallen teammates, the opponent usually executes the wounded immediately, resulting in a long wait for the next round, which is difficult to accept in a game like Cold War, which I prefer to offer a constant stream of unpretentious fun instead of a Counter-Strike-style tactical experience.
The most controversial part of multiplayer is the maps. They suffer from the same problem as the campaign missions: there are really, really few of them, and pretty soon you’ll see all the environments a multiplayer game has to offer. But there’s one saving grace: the maps are really hilarious. Whether you’re fighting indoors or outdoors, there are plenty of ways to surprise your opponent, flank or backstab them, or trade a running tactic for a risky defensive one.
Around the World in Warzones
What’s more, the developers have taken full advantage of the Cold War setting. This time a global rather than a localized conflict, and will take you through the whole world. You’ll be spreading democracy/destroying imperialism in South America, in a German warehouse, in Miami at night, in Moscow, and in the desert – and everywhere you go, you’ll be driven forward not only by patriotic duty but also by the pleasure of virtual tourism. This is despite the fact that the game is objectively uglier than the year-earlier Modern Warfare 2019 reboot, which, to be fair, looked genuinely excellent. Cold War uses an older engine, though, and the developers behind the game are Treyarch, so definitely don’t expect any gorgeousness. The facial animations of the characters in the campaign appear extremely outdated.
On the other hand, the developers have managed, especially in multiplayer, to make something surprisingly “big” out of something relatively little, and the result is a pretty decent visual experience. The campaign can’t sell it, however, not least because the otherwise impressive moments are shot in the back by a silly script, but the simple fact that the 80s are cool comes out in full force in multiplayer. There’s something oddly comforting about shooting KGB boys in Afghanistan, especially compared to last year’s installment where one had to defend (even in multiplayer) the heart of contemporary London from terrorists.
Recap and Final Thoughts
Let’s recap Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War. You can drown a few hours with the story-driven campaign; it’s stupidly entertaining at times, but at the same time, you shake your head and wonder who those unsympathetic individuals running around on the screen are. The multiplayer is a bit like Survivor (you’ll know it from TV). It’s not exactly nourishing “food” for the soul and brain either; it can be the same, but at least there’s always something going on, and you’re in beautiful foreign locations watching capable people who often make you think about yourself, specifically how you could be better.
Undead and Unimpressive
Now zombies, the third mode I haven’t mentioned here yet? Well… zombies are like a half-century-old movie that we’ve seen 30 times because, in one form or another, we’ve seen it a thousand times. You just pick up a few friends, kill a horde of brain-eaters, block the windows with a few planks, and somehow try to survive until the end credits.
And that, dear readers, is Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War…won’t offend you, never impress you. It’s a competent shooter with good multiplayer and a foolish forgettable campaign. In short, it’s a significantly worse game than Modern Warfare a year earlier. In the end, though, I find enough reasons to cautiously recommend the game to fans of the series, mainly due to the fact that it’s an extremely packed content package. You run through the story to feast your eyes on Reagan and Gorbachev, enjoy a meat grinder in multiplayer, and then kill some undead with your buddies. You’ll also be able to use your elaborate load-outs in the Warzone battle royal that the Cold War is linked to.
Conclusion
The new Call of Duty campaign is incredibly dull, but the multiplayer doesn’t try to contrive anything and cheerfully benefits from its attractive Cold War setting. Along with zombies and battle royale Warzone integration, it makes for a great serving of militaristic fun that doesn’t offend.
Where to Buy Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War
Steam (PC): Available for $59.99. You can purchase it directly from Steam.
Xbox Store (Xbox One): Available for $59.99. Check it out on the Xbox Store.
PlayStation Store: Available for $59.99. You can find it on the PlayStation Store.
Official Page: Visit the official Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War page for more information.
Subreddit: Join the discussion on the Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War Subreddit.
The post Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War – A Nostalgic Battlefield Revisited appeared first on WePlayGames.net: Home for Top Gamers.
Přihlásit se
