Synopsis:
Black Ops Cold War is set during the early 80s of the Cold War. The campaign follows CIA operative Russel Adler as he pursues an alleged Soviet spy, whose goal is to subvert the United States and tilt the balance of power towards the Soviet Union.

Publisher: Activision
Reviewed on: PS5
Also available for: PS4, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, PC

Cast: Bruce Thomas, Damon Victor Allen, Reggie Watkins, Lily Cowles, Damon Dayoub, Jeff Bergman, Chris Payne Gilbert

Developer: Raven Software, Treyarch
Director: Dan Vondrak
Writers: David Goyer, Brent Friedman

This review was originally posted as a ‘Review in Progress’ on November 17th. At the time it only reflected our thoughts on the campaign. On December 4th it has been updated and now includes a final score.

This year’s Call of Duty is a special one as it’s the first entry to christen the brand new consoles. Neither Sony nor Microsoft launched their consoles with a shooter (sorry Halo), so it’s all up to COD to showcase the latest hardware and features. On PlayStation, this is in a combination of stunning 4K visuals, ray-traced shadows and using the DualSense controllers’ features like the adaptive triggers. It is a literal gamechanger that I’ve had to adjust to while playing any of the modes included in Call of Duty: Black Ops – Cold War.

My hands have spent thousands of hours at this point, playing first-person-shooters across the PS3 & PS4 and have gotten used to a certain level of input needed to fire any gun. A pistol, shotgun or assault rife all fired the same on previous generations of consoles. The DualSense’s adaptive triggers change all of this by changing the level of tension and vibration within the R2 button as you fire each weapon. It’s not as refined as I’d expect a Sony first-party shooter to feel (where’s the next Resistance game Sony? Insomniac!?), but I quickly went from finding it odd, to never wanting to play a game without it. Between each round of firing a shotgun, the trigger lets loose and tightens back up; a semi-automatic weapon will almost rattle in time with the gun as it fires. Of course, drawing your crossbow back adds an intimate level of tension as you hold before release. When I jumped back into a round of Apex Legends, the controller felt empty and lifeless. I’m really excited to see how developers can fine-tune the DualSense controller to change for weapons in games and Call of Duty: Black Ops – Cold War does an excellent job of showcasing the potential of the controller and first-person shooters.

Since Call of Duty: Black Ops – Cold War is broken up into three distinct parts (single-player campaign, multiplayer and zombies) our review is broken down in three-part as well.

Single Player

I was never a massive Call of Duty guy during the PS3 generation, but I did make time for the Black Ops games. There’s something to be said for their more fantastical story elements. The inclusion of the Zombies mode has always been a testament to this. Call of Duty Black Ops – Cold War is no different. Although it sets the table as a spy thriller during the Cold War, it ends up so far down the conspiracy theory rabbity hole it’s almost ridiculous — but in an exciting Hollywood blockbuster kind of way.

Set during the early 1980’s you play as a player-created character for the first time in the series. Although there are not many options, you do get to name them (you’ll always be referred to by codename “Bell” in-game), pick their pronouns, body type as well as decide specific background information. Were you trained in the CIA? Or maybe MI6? Adding to your dossier, you can pick two perks that allow you to build your character for your playstyle preemptively. A total of fifteen-perks include things like increased hip-fire or the ability to carry more grenades. I took the 25% less damage, and faster weapon reload speeds as I played the game on Veteran difficulty and assumed they’d be most effective.

Returning Call of Duty characters Alex Mason, Frank Woods, Jason Hudson and your player-created character, “Bill” are led by new character Russel Adler on a hunt for a Soviet spy known only by the code name “Perseus.” Being a Call of Duty game, Perseus is after the worlds nuclear bombs, of course, so the stakes are high.

Given the Cold War setting, there aren’t too many large scale shoot-outs. Not to say the game doesn’t feature ballistic action scenes, as it does. They didn’t feel as action-heavy as recent Call of duty games.

You travel from Moscow to Berlin and even return to Vietnam in a couple of flashback sequences. The latter used to introduce the more a-typical Call of Duty level design and ending in a helicopter flight. Vietnam is also the setting of the game’s most inventive level. Raven Software brings all of the narratives puzzle pieces together in a fantastic twist that harkens back to past Black Ops games but also shows the developers tendency for experimental storytelling.

There are multiple endings, I’ve seen three (although only two wildly different), and there may be more. I believe the first one I got to be the narratively good ending, but when I went back and played through the other conclusion, it was a lot more exciting. My original ending was a predicable American heroes saviour moment, whereas the other ending fulfils the games more interesting ideas about Cold War-era Regan and the bombs race. Every year I get somewhat hopeful the franchise will do something brave and new in the campaign. Much like last year’s Modern Warfare campaign, we only get hints of that with Call of Duty: Black Ops – Cold War.

Last year’s Modern Warfare showed a step-up in visual fidelity for the franchise and Call of Duty: Black Ops – Cold War continues the trend. As Alex Mason, you explore the stunning vistas atop Mount Yamantau, as a secret agent your explore the shinning halls of the KGB Headquarters. Bills missions in Vietnam are almost life-like. Flying through the hills the amount of foliage and detail was a photo-perfect moment. For the first time in the history of the franchise, I was wondering where the photo mode was.

Raven Software in the past ten years has been relegated to co-developing Call of Duty games. They must do an excellent job as they’ve had their hands are on nearly every game from Call of Duty: Black Ops to the most recent entry in some fashion. Call of Duty: Black Ops – Cold War shows the studio deserves to be more than a fall-back plan (reports indicate Sledgehammer Games was having issues when developing this game). I’d love to see them get free reign to start their own Call of Duty series.

Multiplayer

With only eight maps at launch and the addition of Nuketown that followed recently, Call of Duty’s multiplayer feels a little empty this year. It’s a real mix-bag of modes as well. With the usual inclusions of Death Match, Team Match, Search and Destroy here but missing is things like Gunfight, which was one of the best modes in Modern Warfare last year. It could have been left out due to it being apart of the gulag in Call of Duty: Warzone, but I don’t think that’s a great reason.

Two big new modes are Fireteam and Combined Arms. Both of which I didn’t enjoy at all. Combined Arms is another attempt from Call of Duty to deliver Battlefield-lite experience with tanks and objective-based goals. It just doesn’t work. Much like last year’s Ground War if you’re on the losing side, you’re either getting blasted by a tank as you spawn, or sniped from afar. All of the maps used in Ground War are open spaces ripe for camping and squashing the enemy team if you get the advantage. Even when I was on the team doing the squashing, it’s not fun.

Fireteam: Dirty Bomb is the most notable new addition this year. It’s a mini-Warzone mode, with a lot in-line with Plunder. You drop in with a team of three other players in a large map and have to seek out uranium and deliver it to drop sites for points. If you’re the team to deliver the final load and set the bomb off, you’ll get a large number of points, and that section of the map will be covered in poisonous gas.

What I’ve ended up enjoying most is the back-to-basics Team Deathmatch. Although there are not as many maps as you’d hope, the ones here are tight, and when combined with the refined Call of Duty shooting experience, it’s still a ton of fun. With the recent addition of Nuketown, Team Deathmatch has cemented itself as the mode to be playing in this year’s Call of Duty multiplayer package.

Zombies

At launch, there’s only one Zombie map available, ‘Die Maschine.’ Although it is a rather large map with plenty of easter eggs and secrets to discover, it’s still just one map. Black Ops 4 launched with four Zombie maps, for comparison. For fans of Zombies, it’s still the classic zombie-killing gameplay you’ve come to expect. There’s a story if you care, or dare, to follow along. Otherwise dropping in with friends and attempting to complete 20 waves, or maybe going through the endless mode, it going to require both skill and patience.

The most significant change this year is the ability to carry over your loadout from the multiplayer to Zombies. This means you no longer start with a pistol and have to build enough points to buy better weapons slowly. You can start the game with a semi-automatic, or shotgun. It’s a nice change of pace and if you’ve played Zombies over the last couple of years, it probably going to be one you’re thankful about. Skipping that opening couple of waves of saving up to buy a decent gun makes the action feel more exciting from the moment wave one kicks into gear.

Dead Ops Arcade has received a significant amount of effort in its third entry. It’s still the top-down twin-stick shooter where you can team up with three other players and try and make it through waves of zombies to complete the campaign, but now with more power-ups and a new campaign. It’s weirdly the hardest thing to finish in the game. It’s never been anything more than a joke mode to me though and something you’d try once or twice, so to see it get a big push as one of the primary arms of the Call of Duty package this year, is just odd.

PlayStation players currently have exclusive access to the Onslaught game mode, which is quite fun and straightforward in the premise. You can team-up with one other player, or go it solo against waves of zombies. The twist is you follow an arm around the map and when it stops defeat zombies until it charges up enough to take you to the next location. Every three waves, an Elite spawns which are quite hard to take down. It feels like this mode could have used a third player because every time I’ve played be and my teammate have been wiped out on the third or fourth Elite spawn. It is a fun mode, though nothing Xbox or PC players should be too upset about missing out on for the first year.

Call of Duty: Black Ops – Cold War is an odd bag of modes and elements. It’s a solid campaign from Raven Software with a somewhat disappointing multiplayer and zombies experience. Both of which are enjoyable enough, but lacking in maps and modes. If you find your groove with the simplistic nature of Team Deathmatch as I have, and that’s enough for you, there’s plenty to enjoy with the highly tuned gunplay that never disappoints. The campaign, although short, does show just how much talent is within Raven and I hope they get a shot at delivering another one, sooner, rather than later.

(Call of Duty: Black Ops – Cold War code provided for review)