Call of Duty Review: Black Ops 4: An excellent shooter who is not afraid to copy

Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 is as impressive as it is abnormal. The game contains very few things that were not done first by others, but it addresses these features in such a refined and unique way that it does not really matter if they are particularly original. It also lacks a single-player mode, marking the first ever modern COD get stripped of a reporting campaign – and the result has become more focused and more fun. Black Ops 4 It could have been an incoherent mixture of torn game elements, but the developer Treyarch has instead reinvented the franchise in a way that could have lasting effects on the way people play. Call of Duty well in the future.

To be fair, the story around COD was one of the lowered expectations. For a while, it looked like the publisher Activision and the small army of developers that she uses to create COD each year the games were simply running out of good ideas. The series remains a best seller because new down payments continue to bring a lot of money back to its hardcore fans. But from around 2014 Advanced War, COD has begun to stagnate creatively, forcing its creators to turn to ideas that are increasingly unrealistic and distant. Jetpacks and exosuits? Sure. Cybernetics and AI? They went there. The war of space? Why not.

By the time Activision announced that its entry last year would come back in World War II, after a particularly strong online reaction against science fiction Infinite war – It seemed that the franchise was in stalemate. Meanwhile, innovation in online multiplayer games was changing everything.

Bungie's destiny open all new ways to treat shooters as persistent online services. Ubisoft Rainbow Six Siege Achieves unprecedented levels of strategy and customization through its robust class system. Blizzard Overwatch completely redesigned the team-based competitive shooter, creating a global phenomenon and electronic sport almost immediately. And perhaps the most important, PUBG and Fortnite helped make the Royal Battle the most popular new genre of the industry.

And now there is Black Ops 4, a game that takes elements of all the above and intelligently remixes them to create the most consistent and forward-looking possible. COD game in a long time. It's still a lot COD The game is brutally fast and openly militaristic. It is designed only for the hyperactive teenagers who inhabit us all. (Sometimes, we get the impression that it's mainly for teens who are literally hyperactive.) But, aside from its aesthetics and its intact game design, Black Ops 4 is a creative and fascinating deviation from the formula. It's not surprising that the title is topping the Twitch charts in its first week, giving the pillars Fortnite and League of Legends a race for their money and keeping the competitive community in check. Casual players also seem to be coming back en masse.

Image: Activisiobn

None of this would have been possible without Blackout, Black Ops 4 's standout addition. This is also the reason why the game is likely to be played for many months. Blackout is Treyarch's opinion on the royal battle and, although the comparisons with Fortnite are obvious, the mode is much more like PUBG in tone and sensation. Immediately, you will see that it looks like PUBG, but with better graphics and performance. Even the blackout solitaire card liberates liberally PUBGThe Erangel introductory sandbox, with its lush green hills, abandoned manufacturing plants and seaside towns.

Battle Royale fans will instantly recognize the basic setup. There is a shrinking circle of damage to dictate the intensity and direction of the fighting. You continue to parachute – or in the case of Blackout – on the surface of an abandoned island full of supplies and firearms. But his way of playing and feeling is unique, allowing Treyarch to carve out his place in the market. On the one hand, Blackout is much faster. You die faster, run faster and fight in much more intense and faster action peaks. You can also heal and revive in just a few seconds, making these battles far more frenzied and durable if you're strategic and clever enough.

There are land vehicles, such as trucks and quads, that allow you to get into the next circle faster. A helicopter also allows you to bypass the entire map in minutes to find the best position. You can even use high-flying combinations from tall structures to the surface, making long-distance battles at the top of skyscrapers and bridges more appealing. Blackout also adds some features of the main multiplayer mode, including mechanical grapples, deployable shields and remotely controlled cars for remote recognition.

Image: Activision

The mode seems vibrant and dynamic, and playing just a few hours last weekend was enough to take me for a way that reminds me of my first Fortnite and PUBG sessions. The big difference I see with Blackout – and what I think will help keep it relevant to an extremely large audience that does not like Battle Royale games – is the lack of skills and tools to to win.

PUBG the matches are long, difficult and can end in a flash if someone succeeds a few half-mile lucky shots. You can often die without ever seeing it coming, and in situations where you simply could not have done much about it. Many newcomers to the game, even when it was first launched last year, struggled to get just one goal per game, not to mention reaching and winning. And since the matches are long, it is difficult to train and improve your game requires a lot of time and effort.

FortniteOn the other hand, you now depend almost entirely on your ability to build structures and refine your goal until it is extremely fast and accurate. Epic continues to add new wacky elements like a destructive structure ATV, deployable fortresses and invisibility stones to mix it up. However, unless you master the basic skills of construction, rapid aim and maneuverability, it is unlikely that you will win a day. Fortnite The average player is much more qualified than six or even three months ago.

Blackout is a different story. Of course, the best of the best can always aim better, move faster and thwart their enemies. But the playing field seems more balanced, and not just because the game mode has just come out. By its nature, fight in a COD the game is flatter – it's easier to kill and get killed in almost any situation. This gives less skilled players an opportunity to beat their opponents and even win victories by playing smart and being lucky.

I can of course see the base of players getting better and better in motion on the map, using strategic positions and relying on the most effective firearms as the mode evolves. But the learning curve here is a lot more appealing. Blackout, it's like playing a standard first person shooter, but in a different context and on a larger scale. It's a lot easier to manage than building structures in the shelter or maneuvering an environment for 20 minutes without seeing a single opponent.

There is also plenty of room for the mode to develop. Treyarch plans to add new fashions, vehicles and items that will upset the fight and change the habits of the players. Even now, players are finding ways to defeat their opponents with basketballs, the tomahawk projectile and crushing vehicles in another. Over time, it is likely that Blackout will become the most refined and accessible version of PUBG, still with FortniteThe will and the ability to evolve permanently.

Image: Activision

Blackout has certainly dominated the story around Black Ops 4, the standard multiplayer mode remains largely intact and refreshing. Now, players choose not only between a set of custom charters, but also special subclasses that grant you more powerful abilities and ultimate style ability, as you'll see in destiny or Overwatch, which charges with time. These existed in Black Ops 3, but Treyarch is doing more here, adding new specialists and leaving much of the end-of-match fights around the strategic use of abilities.

These abilities are also becoming more important as game modes are now more goal-oriented and not just about killing more enemy teams. Control, hardship, theft, search and destruction and domination are more numerous than the traditional modes of killing or killing, of which there are only three. It is clear that Treyarch encourages players to try goal-based modes by giving them a top spot in the list of stars. The mode is associated with the progress system we expected. CODbut with even more beauty products, weapon skins and other makeup items to unlock, to keep players hooked and set on their goals and milestones, including the ever-desirable prestige emblems you get in optimizing your level and starting from scratch.

Many of the changes you will recognize as the influence of Rainbox Six Siege, with little bits of destiny and Overwatch sprinkled in. But no element feels so prevalent that it dilutes the core COD experience, which is always to run as fast as possible and accumulate a high number of killed while (hopefully) reaching a goal for your team. Players who loved the past COD games, especially newer ones, will always find it nice, while unused players who may not have played since Modern War or Black Ops 2 the days should be able to acclimatize perfectly with a few hours of practice.

To complete the experience, a Zombies mode revisited sends waves of undead controlled by AI to you and to a team of strangers or friends. There are now two separate scenarios for zombies, Aether and Chaos, which have different maps and characters, and it is clear that the mode is designed to replace a traditional campaign because the story is fleshed out by dialogue and some secret cinematics locked behind Easter eggs. It's far from Hollywood stories COD has delivered in the past, but zombies should, for most people, do the work and scratch the itching of the single player mode.

It is too early to say what will be the magnitude of the power outage or what will be the future of COD next year, when developer Infinity Ward, developer, will in turn launch the next product as part of the franchise's three-year development cycle. But Black Ops 4 will have an undeniable and disproportionate impact on the future of this series and the genre it dominates, if only to cement the royal battle mode as a must for any big budget online shooter.

We could see the return of a reporting campaign next year, while Zombies will clear up until the time for Treyarch to shine again. But I can not see COD Fans eagerly buy another registration, unless it's all that the game has done, and more, including Blackout. For a franchise that is older than many of its players and has not stopped publishing a game since the PS2 era, it's quite an accomplishment. And while Black Ops 4 might not be a Fortnite killer, it is certainly proven that the slow shooting game industry and risk averse can still make a big jump when he wishes.