Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 is the latest addition to the Call of Duty franchise.
The game acts as the next mainline entry to Call of Duty Black Ops: Cold War released back in 2020. We got our hands on the game and have a few opinions on it. Here is a complete review of Call of Duty: Black Ops 6, the good, the bad, and the ugly.
The Campaign
Before diving into the multiplayer aspect, at the helm of Black Ops 6 is its campaign. Now, recent Call of Duty games have had very short campaigns, which garnered a lot of unwanted attention from the audiences. Not too much has changed with the new one. It is slightly longer than last year’s Modern Warfare 3, but still very short coming in at around 6 to 8 hours.
Overall, the story was decent and it marks the return of some notable characters.
As for the setting, Black Ops 6 takes you to the early 1990s. The campaign takes place during a period of uncertainty in global politics, which sees the United States emerging as the superpower of the world.
The story has a lot of twists and turns making it one of the most interesting Call of Duty plots we’ve had in years.
Multiplayer
Multiplayer has been a big focus for this year’s Call of Duty. There are some new elements to it especially new movement mechanics that we will get on to later in this review. For starters, Black Ops 6 comes with tons of content at launch.
It introduces 16 brand new maps with more to come as the game progresses. It also offers Strike maps which are smaller than the regular ones but offer 6v6 or 2v2 gameplay, which we had fun with. It also brings back the Zombies mode.
The mode is really fun and is round-based with a very detailed map that has launched with the full game. The gameplay is very rewarding and will be very familiar to veteran Call of Duty players.
1. Movement
Brand new to Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 is the Omnimovement System. This allows you to slide, sprint or dive in any direction possible, opening up new possibilities for in-game tactics and skills.
However, when you first use it, it might seem a bit overwhelming. It feels that the movement is out of your control leading to less precise gameplay. So, there is a learning curve associated with it, but you do eventually get used to it.
2. Weapons
The weapons are the biggest gripe we have with Black Ops 6. The gunplay is overall excellent, but that is to be expected from such a fleshed-out franchise. However, weapons don’t feel the best as of yet.
The guns in Modern Warfare 3 had a heft to them. It felt like every shot accounted for something. With Black Ops 6, guns seem to have been toned down, so your shots don’t seem to count too much, which can be annoying at times.
This is something that can be easily fixed with an update. As we are currently in the very early stages of the game’s release, expect plenty of updates going forward, that are bound to improve the game a lot.
3. Other Minor Changes
Treyarch seems to have listened to the feedback from previous Call of Duty games and improved upon them. Special attention has been put towards quality-of-life features, especially the HUD and the in-game menu.
The UI now introduces vertical menus which are a lot easier to manage than before. If there is a long list of things you simply have to scroll upwards or downwards to access them. In addition, melee weapons now have their slot in the weapons menu.
Conclusion
Overall, Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 is turning into a great game. It still retains the smaller campaign from recent entries but makes the overall plot very interesting.
The graphics are some of the best we’ve seen especially for a cross-platform game. There are some minor hiccups in the gameplay, especially in the multiplayer, but that is to be expected from a brand-new release.
Most of the issues can be ironed out through a few updates.
Nonetheless, Treyarch seems to have done a decent job with the game. Black Ops 6 took 4 years to develop, which is much more than some of the recent releases. The years of work put into the game clearly show that it is a step in the right direction for the franchise.
