Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War Multiplayer Review
A return to tradition
Call of Duty as a franchise is something I’ve had an on-again-off-again relationship with. The first game I played in the series was Black Ops 2, one of the highest-rated titles in the franchise, and with good reason.
I played Black Ops 2 on my PlayStation 3 so much I actually got to Prestige 2 before my attention was completely diverted when I finally got a copy of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. I’ve never had a first-person shooter game captivate me quite like Black Ops 2 did, especially when it gave me the incredibly satisfying feeling of mowing enemies down with a machine pistol, the KAP-40.
Luckily, to my pleasant surprise, Activision has brought back some of the things I loved about Black Ops 2 into their latest title. In this review, I hope to answer the question, “is Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War worth the $60 asking price?”
The first 35 levels
Like many of my fellow Call of Duty veterans, I bought the game for the online multiplayer mode. Team Deathmatch is and always will be a fantastic, simple gameplay mode players can enjoy over and over again.
The objective of Team Deathmatch is simple: two teams of 5–6 players each run around the map shooting each other until one team scores 100 points (1 kill = 1 point.) The more kills you get, the more opportunities you have to use Scorestreaks: powerups that help increase your chances of winning the match.
The most common powerup you’ll see is the Spy Plane. It’s one of the easiest to unlock and is pretty helpful during a fight, allowing you to see where enemy targets are on the map. The Spy Plane is the 80s equivalent of Black Ops 2’s UAV, keeping the winning formula for the series alive.
Weapons
In the menu screen, weapons are highly customizable, featuring as many as 54 possible attachments. You can equip up to 5 of these on your primary weapon, or up to 8 with the Gunfighter Wildcard equipped.
The more kills you gather with your selected weapon, the more it levels up along with your character, providing you with new attachments and camouflage to customize. This feature has been carried over from Activision’s second most recent release, Modern Warfare, and I’m bittersweet about the mechanic.
On the one hand, customizing your weapon in a video game to this level of detail hasn’t been done before, and it’s pretty cool to see how attachments actually have a meaningful impact on your playstyle. On the other hand, it makes me miss the Black Ops 2 days where you could have 9 possible attachments, 3 of which you could apply to your weapon, and that was it.
The complexity and sheer variability of the current weapon customization system might be intimidating for some and turn off others who just want to drop into a lobby and blow off steam by blowing off another player’s head.
Microtransactions
A trend that has been plaguing the gaming industry as of late has been microtransactions, small payments game companies incentivize you to pay to increase your overall enjoyment of the title. Fortnite has V-Bucks to customize your character’s looks and emotes, Watch_Dogs, Assassin’s Creed, and others have DLC packs to increase the number of missions/levels in the game, and Call of Duty has both its own currency and a Season Pass upgrade.
You can pay money to buy Call of Duty points and use those points for weapon and character cosmetics, and by purchasing the Season Pass you can unlock more weapons, player skins, calling cards, and other digital goodies by regularly playing the game.
This content should already be included in the $60 price of a game instead of something that has been intentionally removed and resold to the general public. We’ve gotten to a point where there are multiple editions of the same game for sale available on launch day, a “base” edition for $60, a “deluxe” edition for $70, and a “gold” edition for $100.
The problem I have with the two most recent versions of Call of Duty is how after every match, you’re shown a progress tracker of your character through the current season and all the items you could be unlocking if you purchased the Season Pass. I’ve already paid $60 for the game, why should I pay more?
Don’t get me wrong, cosmetics are fantastic additions to a game. But when most of them are locked behind paywalls, the average consumer won’t be able to enjoy them.
The Black Ops 2 influence
One thing that has been kept in one form or another from Black Ops 2 is the Proximity Mine, aka the “Bouncing Betty” of Black Ops Cold War. The Proximity Mine serves as a Field Upgrade or what I refer to as another Scorestreak that’s accessible to anyone regardless of how poorly they’re doing in a given match.
By pressing both L1 and R1 on your PS4 controller or LB and RB on Xbox, you can place a mine that will jump up and detonate when an enemy walks near. Strategic placement of your Proximity Mine is key: if an enemy spots it, they can shoot it to prematurely cause detonation, rendering your advantage useless.
There’s something inherently gratifying about placing a mine behind a corner, moving to a different part of the map, and getting a notification onscreen letting you know some unfortunate player blew himself up.
The other thing I loved about this iteration is the inclusion of some maps from Black Ops 2, namely, Express and Raid. Both have been touched up a little to reflect the 80s time period your characters are fighting in, and the sense of nostalgic familiarity I have with the maps add to my overall gameplay experience. I find myself coming back to play even if I’m losing a match on these maps just because they remind me of the great times I had playing Black Ops 2 back when I was fifteen.
“Mr. Gorbechov, tear down this (pay)wall.”
Call of Duty isn’t the same as it used to be. The influence of microtransactions and the increasing complexity of games has taken the industry by storm, and these trends don’t seem to be going anywhere anytime soon.
I enjoy a lot of things about Black Ops Cold War. The gunplay feels nice, the 80s themed maps are refreshing, the inclusion of maps and the 80s version of a Bouncing Betty from Black Ops 2, and the time period are all great reasons to pick up this game and give it a try.
Is it worth the $60 asking price? To a veteran Call of Duty player, yes. But for those seeking to play a solid first-person shooter, I wouldn’t recommend picking this up for anything above the $45 mark. Wait until a sale, free up some space on your gaming device of choice, pick up a copy, and turn up some Take On Me.
