The developers are playing. Sometimes they succeed, and sometimes they overdo it.
With the series coming to Game Pass, Call of Duty: Black Ops 6’s campaign is on the radar of players who don’t want to spend long hours in multiplayer and have been driven in recent years by the belief that Call of Duty isn’t worth purchasing for the story. I’m talking about myself. Beyond the cost of a subscription for PC and Xbox, in the case of Black Ops 6 it’s a full eight-hour campaign that heals the wounds caused by Modern Warfare’s short and, above all, unsuccessful story mode. 3 speaks for the last part. How did the new product work?
Spy thriller on the road
I admit that in the case of Call of Duty, I always liked modern conflicts from the present or near future more. So I gravitated towards titles mainly from the Infinity Ward workshops, on the contrary, I missed the Black Ops series and Treyarch games in general, this time also Ravena. Early nineties and the Gulf War, that’s all almost realand for this reason, the setting and aesthetics were Black Ops 6’s biggest selling point for me.
Already at this first point, joy and disappointment beat within me. I am happy precisely because of the aesthetics and realities that can be observed in the background of the story. We look at the battlefields of Kuwait and Iraq, catch a glimpse of Governor Bill Clinton, hear a mention of Arpanet, and the haze of the end of the Cold War hangs over the scene. Not to mention the seemingly authentic technologies and environment.
An authentic environment that pleases the eye.
But I have already subtly mentioned the reason for a certain discontent. You can enjoy it all, but it never gets to the center of the action. This is just background, serving as tinsel to a good, but quite standard and unremarkable spy thriller, the action of which could easily have taken place at any other time and anywhere.
The story itself is constructed quite well. It makes sense, the content is consistent with the footage, the breakdown depends on the missions and gameplay, but nothing too powerful. We will also see a successful turnaround. There is no need to talk about the cinematic presentation, especially brilliant in cut scenes between missions thanks to photorealistic graphics.
The real conflict takes place against the backdrop of a fictional plot.
However, the authors have prepared one controversial surprise. It’s the inclusion of some sort of supernatural elements. Without giving too much away, the campaign borrows content from the zombie mode, and while everything is rationally explained and there are no ghosts in it, I ask: does that matter? I have different expectations from Call of Duty. While surprises are nice, I would have happily done without these passages.
Again, on the positive side, Call of Duty has managed to create memorable characters after a long time. Whether they are new ones who hold promise for the future, or returnees. This is Woods, known to Cold War Black Ops players, and especially Russell Adler. The teamwork of non-CIA operatives who simultaneously work behind the CIA’s back and investigate the CIA’s ties to the secret paramilitary group Pantheon (yes, that’s not true) works very well.
One day like this and one day like that
If there’s one thing the developers can’t deny this time around, it’s the effort. There’s definitely no sloppy campaign in Black Ops 6. We will look at a number of locations, which include the already mentioned conflict zones in the Middle East, as well as pleasant nineties offices, research centers or casinos.
Additionally, however, the gameplay changes dramatically from mission to mission. Those expecting an adrenaline rush along a linear corridor like the older installments may be a little disappointed. Such missions are also waiting for you and, I dare say, the majority of them, although logically they belong to the shorter ones. In addition to them, the game also has open locations, one of which you can even travel by car. You can spend fifteen minutes in it, maybe you can even drown in it even in the first hours.
The largest open location can be explored by vehicle.
From the very beginning you will get a taste of a spy mission that will offer several ways to solve a given situation, in other cases you will replace different team members. But the experiment doesn’t always succeed, and that surprising mid-game mission that could potentially change how players feel about the previous narrative is unfortunately very weak in terms of gameplay. The final missions are similar. Again, weaker gameplay goes hand in hand with weaker plot points.
My understanding is that players want the old, traditional, linear narrative. To some extent, neither did I, but with the exceptions mentioned, I didn’t mind the attempts to spice up the gameplay; on the contrary, they were a nice break up for the otherwise monotonous shooting.
There’s no shortage of hair-raising action sequences.
What I would have liked was a hub that you visit between missions where you can chat with team members or buy multiplayer perks that are more often missed than appreciated in combat. The team’s base is hidden behind said secret, hidden behind simple puzzles. From my point of view, this location has one big advantage – you don’t have to spend almost any time there.
In the case of Call of Duty, we probably don’t need to talk about gunplay and action gameplay. This aspect has been brought to near perfection by the developers over the years of working on the series, and perhaps more than any other, this shooter is characterized by the fact that playing it on a gamepad is not a punishment, but a reward.
The Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 campaign will ultimately be rewarding if you can put up with the hallucinogenic, supernatural, surreal or zombie passages, whatever you want to call them, and if you take part in the developer’s game. They do play with the player in different ways, and it’s almost certain that everyone will be interested in a different mission, amused by another mission, surprised by another, and frustrated by another.
Source :Indian TV
