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| The attachment that ruined Modern Warfare 2. |
Thankfully, Treyarch fixed this issue in the following addition to the series: Call of Duty: Black Ops. The other aspects of multiplayer in that game, however, were terrible. Even after a nerfing patch, the Famas was easily the best gun in the game, with low recoil, an immense firing rate and high damage, it was more or the less the only gun seen used in most games. The SMGs didn't exactly have a clean halo either - the MP5k and the AK74u outclassed all the other SMGs easily. Quickscoping, however, was more or less impossible, which was one of the few things Treyarch most definitely did right. Zombies also made a return from World at War with tons of new features and more maps. Zombies was much, much more fun than the fairly unrealistic campaign or the unbalanced multiplayer.
Then along came Modern Warfare 3 in 2011, which fixed many of Infinity Ward's previous takes on the series, fixing niggles such as grenade launchers and removing Danger Close and One Man Army. Quickscoping was much easier than in Black Ops, but harded than Modern Warfare 2. The guns all kill too quickly- which in a way, actually makes the game balanced. Survival Mode was a welcome addition to Special Ops, but they botched the fairly repetitive campaign. Overall, an enjoyable game.
And then, on November 13, 2012, out came Black Ops II from Treyarch's metaphorical womb. With it were tons of new features, guns and equipment due to the developers having a lot more freedom with the technology as it is set just over a decade from now, in the future.
I can say one thing for sure this time around - they nailed the campaign for me. Instead of just point-and-shoot, run to objectives and complete the mission, you now have a lot more freedom - that is, you can make critical decisions that affect the story. There is a point around halfway through the campaign where the main antagonist, a narco-terrorist called Raul Menendez, is seemingly captured and brought in front of a building where Frank Woods, one of the main protagonists of Black Ops 1 and 2, is told to shoot him with a sniper rifle. You have a choice - shoot him in the head and kill him instantly, or shoot him the leg. Both actions drastically affect your ending.
There are around four different endings to the story, all revolving around Raul Menendez. There is a "good" ending, where sacrifices have to made for the final result, and a "bad" ending, which you usually get when you don't do the Strike Force missions.
Strike Force controls more like an RTS game - you can give orders for a squad to go and defend one objective, or to attack another. If you're not one for strategy, you can also hop into a camera feed of one of the ground troops you're controlling and play as them to complete the objective. There is an option to skip these missions, which, as I said before, usually nets you the "bad" ending due to a few of them involving key characters.
The first half of the campaign often switches timelines. Some play in a period in the 80s where you play as Alex Mason, main protagonist of Black Ops 1, or Frank Woods, presumed dead at the end of the first game. Jason Hudson also returns, but with a less major role, and Grigori Weaver is never mentioned. The other missions allow you to play as David Mason, Alex's son, in 2025 with futuristic equipment and weaponry. Attachments such as the Millimetre Scope, which allows you to locate enemies behind walls and doors, and the Target Finder which functions similarly but has higher zoom, are available.
Throughout the entire campaign, you can now customise your loadout from the start. If you unlock future weapons, you can (rather unrealistically) use them in the past, which funnily enough nets you an achievement/trophy. You can choose three attachments for both your weapons, and you can use a primary weapon as a secondary, too. You can also choose two perks to help with gameplay. Overall, the campaign is my favourite one of the series so far, competing even with Modern Warfare 2. Treyarch added a ton of new features, which they absolutely nailed. The only niggle I find is every now and then you get killed by explosions you have no warning of - grenades sometimes glitch so the warning icon is not shown. Almost invisible snipers are also included, making playing the game through on Veteran a hefty challenge.
On to the most anticipated mode of the game - Zombies. Technically, you start off with only one map (if you have the Hardened/Care Package edition or the Season Pass you also get Nuketown Zombies which I don't have and therefore have no sure-fire opinion on). The map is known as Green Run, as is set somewhere in the Northern Hemisphere. It includes many future and past weapons, ranging from the Israeli Galil from the late 60s to the HAMR, a futuristic light machine gun similar to the Scar-H and the Scar-L from previous titles. It is, however, split into three "Survival" maps (the traditional mode of playing from Black Ops and World at War), "Town" (my favourite), "Farm" (my least favourite) and "Bus Depot". All of these maps are playable at once along with many new areas in a new game mode called "TranZit".
Have a play of TranZit and then Survival and it's pretty obvious which mode Treyarch have focused more on - the former. On Survival and Grief (we'll get to that later) your character doesn't even have a voice, and TranZit has a lot more Easter Eggs and achievements than Survival, which is a shame because I play the latter a lot more than TranZit as I usually play solo.
When you see early Black Ops 2 info videos by people like TmarTn and Ali-A, you always see some mention of an innovative 8-player Zombies mode - Grief being exactly that. You're split into teams, the Centre for Disease Control or the CIA. It doesn't really make a difference which team you're on - no-one has a voice, but the CIA wear suits while the CDC wear hazmat safety clothing. You have the choice of working together or against each other, and power-ups only affect the team who get it (even with Max Ammos, which is really annoying). You can't kill enemy players directly, but you can do things like knifing them while they're reviving their teammates to stop the process.
All this sounds rather enjoyable, don't you think? Well, for the most part, you'd be right, except for one little pointless, infuriating feature that almost ruins the gaming experience as a whole.
Lava.
If you take a look at that picture again, you'll notice near the Pack-A-Punch machine to the left, there's a massive pool of it. And see those cracks near it? Those spread throughout the whole map. Every map. 4 hits by the lava without Juggernog and you're down. If that's not bad enough, if a zombie runs through the crack or the pool, they get set on fire for about 30 seconds. If you kill them while they're on fire, they explode. The explosion damages you about as much as half a zombie smack. It might not sound like much, but on the early rounds, getting smacked once, then going over a crack for 2 seconds, then getting hit by an explosion downs you pretty often. I know for a fact I'm not the only one praying for a patch soon that gives you an option to turn the lava off - it's infuriating.
Now on to multiplayer - and you have to give credit to Treyarch, they always like change. Almost all the killstreaks are new, and include the Dragonfire, a quadrotor vehicle to mow down enemies, the Hunter Killer drone, a small rocket that seeks out enemies, and the VSat which functions similarly to the Advanced UAV and Blackbird from previous titles. Most of the killstreaks aren't too annoying, but there are two which really, really annoy me and a lot of other people. These killstreaks being the Lightning Strike and the Guardian.
I don't mind the Lightning Strike for the most part, but it's so, so easy to get spawntrapped by them. There's no "Ultra Blast Shield" like in Modern Warfare 3 yet, and the UAV shows people on the mini-map who have just spawned. It's not the fault of the players, really, it's just the killstreak's effectiveness that needs fixing.
The Guardian is, in short, overpowered. It's basically like a huge fan that blows out radiation that slows down and slowly kills anyway caught in the rays. This time it is the community's fault. They always, always put it at a secluded place near the spawn of the other team, and they get caught in it as soon as they spawn. Treyarch, fix it please.
Generally, the guns are very balanced - I haven't been killed by a grenade launcher at all yet. That said, the game is generally SMG-dominant, with the PDW-57 and the MSMC being used very often. Quickscoping is back, although it's much harder to do so than in previous titles as the aim assist's been toned down and the bullet spread can be rather sporadic.
Lag compensation and bullet registration is a major problem. If you miss one bullet you'll die in most gunfights, and sometimes even if all your bullets are on target you'll still die, even on a 4 or 5-bar connection.
All in all, Black Ops II is an enjoyable game with a lot of niggles - but due to the magic that is patching and updates, by the end of next year it's sure to be generally a much more enjoyable gaming experience, with new maps and game modes to keep the dying Call of Duty series on its feet.
8/10
Thanks for reading!
Then along came Modern Warfare 3 in 2011, which fixed many of Infinity Ward's previous takes on the series, fixing niggles such as grenade launchers and removing Danger Close and One Man Army. Quickscoping was much easier than in Black Ops, but harded than Modern Warfare 2. The guns all kill too quickly- which in a way, actually makes the game balanced. Survival Mode was a welcome addition to Special Ops, but they botched the fairly repetitive campaign. Overall, an enjoyable game.
And then, on November 13, 2012, out came Black Ops II from Treyarch's metaphorical womb. With it were tons of new features, guns and equipment due to the developers having a lot more freedom with the technology as it is set just over a decade from now, in the future.
I can say one thing for sure this time around - they nailed the campaign for me. Instead of just point-and-shoot, run to objectives and complete the mission, you now have a lot more freedom - that is, you can make critical decisions that affect the story. There is a point around halfway through the campaign where the main antagonist, a narco-terrorist called Raul Menendez, is seemingly captured and brought in front of a building where Frank Woods, one of the main protagonists of Black Ops 1 and 2, is told to shoot him with a sniper rifle. You have a choice - shoot him in the head and kill him instantly, or shoot him the leg. Both actions drastically affect your ending.
There are around four different endings to the story, all revolving around Raul Menendez. There is a "good" ending, where sacrifices have to made for the final result, and a "bad" ending, which you usually get when you don't do the Strike Force missions.
Strike Force controls more like an RTS game - you can give orders for a squad to go and defend one objective, or to attack another. If you're not one for strategy, you can also hop into a camera feed of one of the ground troops you're controlling and play as them to complete the objective. There is an option to skip these missions, which, as I said before, usually nets you the "bad" ending due to a few of them involving key characters.
The first half of the campaign often switches timelines. Some play in a period in the 80s where you play as Alex Mason, main protagonist of Black Ops 1, or Frank Woods, presumed dead at the end of the first game. Jason Hudson also returns, but with a less major role, and Grigori Weaver is never mentioned. The other missions allow you to play as David Mason, Alex's son, in 2025 with futuristic equipment and weaponry. Attachments such as the Millimetre Scope, which allows you to locate enemies behind walls and doors, and the Target Finder which functions similarly but has higher zoom, are available.
Throughout the entire campaign, you can now customise your loadout from the start. If you unlock future weapons, you can (rather unrealistically) use them in the past, which funnily enough nets you an achievement/trophy. You can choose three attachments for both your weapons, and you can use a primary weapon as a secondary, too. You can also choose two perks to help with gameplay. Overall, the campaign is my favourite one of the series so far, competing even with Modern Warfare 2. Treyarch added a ton of new features, which they absolutely nailed. The only niggle I find is every now and then you get killed by explosions you have no warning of - grenades sometimes glitch so the warning icon is not shown. Almost invisible snipers are also included, making playing the game through on Veteran a hefty challenge.
On to the most anticipated mode of the game - Zombies. Technically, you start off with only one map (if you have the Hardened/Care Package edition or the Season Pass you also get Nuketown Zombies which I don't have and therefore have no sure-fire opinion on). The map is known as Green Run, as is set somewhere in the Northern Hemisphere. It includes many future and past weapons, ranging from the Israeli Galil from the late 60s to the HAMR, a futuristic light machine gun similar to the Scar-H and the Scar-L from previous titles. It is, however, split into three "Survival" maps (the traditional mode of playing from Black Ops and World at War), "Town" (my favourite), "Farm" (my least favourite) and "Bus Depot". All of these maps are playable at once along with many new areas in a new game mode called "TranZit".
Have a play of TranZit and then Survival and it's pretty obvious which mode Treyarch have focused more on - the former. On Survival and Grief (we'll get to that later) your character doesn't even have a voice, and TranZit has a lot more Easter Eggs and achievements than Survival, which is a shame because I play the latter a lot more than TranZit as I usually play solo.
When you see early Black Ops 2 info videos by people like TmarTn and Ali-A, you always see some mention of an innovative 8-player Zombies mode - Grief being exactly that. You're split into teams, the Centre for Disease Control or the CIA. It doesn't really make a difference which team you're on - no-one has a voice, but the CIA wear suits while the CDC wear hazmat safety clothing. You have the choice of working together or against each other, and power-ups only affect the team who get it (even with Max Ammos, which is really annoying). You can't kill enemy players directly, but you can do things like knifing them while they're reviving their teammates to stop the process.
 |
| Low-quality image, but you can just about see a CIA member to the right of the downed players and a CDC player further to the right. One CDC member is down, in yellow, and a CIA member is also down nearby. This is on the map Town. |
Lava.
If you take a look at that picture again, you'll notice near the Pack-A-Punch machine to the left, there's a massive pool of it. And see those cracks near it? Those spread throughout the whole map. Every map. 4 hits by the lava without Juggernog and you're down. If that's not bad enough, if a zombie runs through the crack or the pool, they get set on fire for about 30 seconds. If you kill them while they're on fire, they explode. The explosion damages you about as much as half a zombie smack. It might not sound like much, but on the early rounds, getting smacked once, then going over a crack for 2 seconds, then getting hit by an explosion downs you pretty often. I know for a fact I'm not the only one praying for a patch soon that gives you an option to turn the lava off - it's infuriating.
Now on to multiplayer - and you have to give credit to Treyarch, they always like change. Almost all the killstreaks are new, and include the Dragonfire, a quadrotor vehicle to mow down enemies, the Hunter Killer drone, a small rocket that seeks out enemies, and the VSat which functions similarly to the Advanced UAV and Blackbird from previous titles. Most of the killstreaks aren't too annoying, but there are two which really, really annoy me and a lot of other people. These killstreaks being the Lightning Strike and the Guardian.I don't mind the Lightning Strike for the most part, but it's so, so easy to get spawntrapped by them. There's no "Ultra Blast Shield" like in Modern Warfare 3 yet, and the UAV shows people on the mini-map who have just spawned. It's not the fault of the players, really, it's just the killstreak's effectiveness that needs fixing.
The Guardian is, in short, overpowered. It's basically like a huge fan that blows out radiation that slows down and slowly kills anyway caught in the rays. This time it is the community's fault. They always, always put it at a secluded place near the spawn of the other team, and they get caught in it as soon as they spawn. Treyarch, fix it please.
Generally, the guns are very balanced - I haven't been killed by a grenade launcher at all yet. That said, the game is generally SMG-dominant, with the PDW-57 and the MSMC being used very often. Quickscoping is back, although it's much harder to do so than in previous titles as the aim assist's been toned down and the bullet spread can be rather sporadic.
Lag compensation and bullet registration is a major problem. If you miss one bullet you'll die in most gunfights, and sometimes even if all your bullets are on target you'll still die, even on a 4 or 5-bar connection.
All in all, Black Ops II is an enjoyable game with a lot of niggles - but due to the magic that is patching and updates, by the end of next year it's sure to be generally a much more enjoyable gaming experience, with new maps and game modes to keep the dying Call of Duty series on its feet.
8/10
Thanks for reading!
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