Okay Geek Farm
Xbox 360 Review - Call of Duty: Black Ops
Alex Tretrop
Story: Since it’s Treyarch’s turn at the reins, the company has moved players out of modern times and back to more historical battles, like Vietnam or the Bay of Pigs. Taking an interesting, and ultimately, better choice for the series, you’ll play as only one character, Alex Mason, for the majority of the game instead of constantly switching back and forth as in previous COD iterations.
Most of the game is also told via flashback as Mason is being interrogated, which allows you to jump between large spans of time very quickly. It feels pretty cool when you’re in the middle of a firefight to be pulled right back to your torture chair and back to a completely different memory in the span of just a couple seconds because it really reinforces the feeling that Mason is on the brink of madness and it keeps the story interesting.
Although story has typically taken a back seat to gameplay throughout the COD franchise, there’s a lot more of a narrative this time around. However, that doesn’t mean much despite it being nothing short of epic, with a large plot twist closer to the end that’s fantastic. In the end, the story within the actual gameplay segments aren’t much more than a bunch of characters screaming into your ear to blow up the next gun emplacement, or leading you up to the game’s next crazy setpiece moment.
Gameplay: If there’s one thing Call of Duty always gets right it’s the guns. There always seems to be a brand new one to use in each and every level, and they all have their own unique look and feel to them. And since we’re talking about Treyarch here, everything feels much more grittier than Infinity Ward’s work, with plenty of dismembering limbs and much more… graphic kills, which is definitely a welcome addition, especially considering the brutal wars the game is depicting.
Multiplayer remains nearly unchanged - you’ve still got the same game modes, perks, and kill streaks for the most part, but Treyarch have added some of their own spins on things to make for some generally fun online play. One of those comes in the form of COD Points, which is an in-game currency used to unlock everything from weapons and their attachments to kill streaks and perks. To me however, this change is more of a double-edged sword; on one hand, you can focus on what you want to unlock for your play style. So if you never want to see an Sniper Rifle like me then you don’t have to, but on the other hand once you unlock everything you care about, it takes away some of the addictive qualities of getting to the highest level because there’s really nothing left to strive for.
Finally, you can also bet your COD Points on special game modes that are all thrilling to play from Gun Game, which gives you a new weapon after every kill, to One in the Chamber where you only have a pistol with a single bullet but you can take another person’s bullet when you kill them, which can make for some seriously intense matches.
;)
;)
;)
Visual/Audio: The visuals, for the most part, look exactly the same as Modern Warfare 2 except with a bit more of Treyarch’s visceral twist. The standout to me was just how great the fire and smoke effects looked, especially with the new flamethrower attachments to guns and the ridiculous amount of explosions you see in the campaign.
Audio was a mixed bag for me this time around. The unlicensed music is fantastic and some of your squad mates like Woods and Reznov, who are voiced by Ice-T and Gary Oldman respectively, have some pretty standout performances. It’s also worth mentioning that the guns and explosions all sound freaking amazing as well. But for every cool thing you hear, there’s always something that brings it down, be it from their horrible use of licensed music or Sam Worthington’s abysmal (in my opinion) and horribly inconsistent voice of the main character. It’s really disappointing to me that such small problems all pooled together to make such a lame audio experience.
Difficulty: Surprisingly, Black Ops is pretty challenging. Playing on the regular difficulty you will die if you do something stupid like run into the line of fire or keep your head out for too long, but with enough tries you’ll always eventually make it through a tough firefight. It’s great to see a game who actually puts up a fight since so many games nowadays are way too easy!
Hours to Complete: The campaign is very short at only around 8 hours but, let’s be honest, many of us come to this game for the multiplayer, and its addictive qualities will probably keep you up for many nights to come.
;)
;)
;)
;)
Opinion: I feel like there isn’t a whole lot to say about Black Ops, personally. By this time you already know if you’re going to pick it up or not because it’s much like Halo, where you, for the most part, know it’s more of the exact same stuff in past iterations. For what it’s worth though, I thought the Campaign was one of the most action packed yet and the multiplayer isn’t as much of the total unbalanced mess it was in Modern Warfare 2. Just be wary that if you’re playing with friends, the game loves to drop you from your group often and be aware that since this is a COD game, the community is filled to the brim with idiots that most of our readers probably don’t want to know.
Play or Pass: If you’re a fan of COD then I have no doubt you’ll definitely enjoy your time with the campaign in Black Ops. The multiplayer hasn’t really changed too much but, at this point, it doesn’t really have to because everyone’s still playing it. So if you’ve enjoyed it in the past you will here too. In fact, nothing substantial has really changed with the exception of some noteworthy cameos from some pretty historical icons.
