REVIEW: ‘Call of Duty: Black Ops 6’ Campaign Is A Return To Form For The Franchise (PC)

Over the past few decades, the Call of Duty franchise has become a behemoth first-person shooter series with Modern Warfare and Black Ops carrying that success. Its yearly releases take the world by storm and attract millions of players. Call of Duty: Black Ops 6, developed by Treyarch and Raven Software and published by Activision, is the latest in the long-running blockbuster franchise that rights a few wrongs made in last year’s edition.

The Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 campaign takes place 10 years after the events of Black Ops Cold War, released in 2020. Players take on the role of William “Case” Calderon, a CIA operative as he fights against a shadowy clandestine force. The first mission takes place in Kuwait, where things go terribly wrong for Case and his team, resulting in the death of Iraqi Minister of Defense Saeed Alawi.

Case and his small team encounter the mysterious group known as Pantheon which complicates the mission. A firefight ensues and players escape by the skin of their teeth and into freedom. Or so it seems. Just when the mission is wrapping up, Russell Adler (the protagonist from Black Ops Cold War) shows up and kills Alawi before surrendering and offering up important intel.

This opening does a great job of setting the tone: There will be countless twists and turns in a dark and gritty story about agents going off the books and even some action-packed moments. Case is suspended from the CIA along with Troy Marshall and Black Ops veteran Frank Woods. The trio forms a clandestine team to investigate Pantheon and the mystery behind “The Cradle,” a weapon that involves Pantheon, the CIA, and Saddam Hussein.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 takes players across the globe looking into the conspiracy in 11 different high-octane missions. Once the story steps on the gas it never really hits the brakes until the very end. There are a couple of serious twists towards the end as well as heart-pounding moments that leave players wondering how they can possibly succeed. Some story beats were a bit obvious to see coming but for the most part, it keeps players on their toes.

The story also tries to involve real-life people like Hussein and Bill Clinton but they don’t serve much of a purpose. They are mostly there to try to ground the story and make it more realistic but there is not any real commentary on their real-life actions during that time period other than “America good, Iraq bad,” which was pretty disappointing. Having Pantheon, a group made up of mostly former US military operatives, serve as a major bad guy does start to delve into the idea of critiquing America’s involvement in the Middle East but it is not a serious or in-depth critique. That’s fairly standard for a Call of Duty game, but that doesn’t make it any less disappointing.

The way Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 manages to keep players invested is down to the excellent pacing of gameplay styles. Stealth is a major part of the campaign, but these moments of sneaking around are often met with incredible firefights that break up the mundane. Just when players start to get tired of sneaking around and taking down guards, there are epic fights against hordes of enemies that get harder as the story progresses. There are also some wilder level options like one involving zombies that help break things up.

The stealth itself is not anything spectacular but it does the job. Crouch down behind cover to avoid guards, take them out either with your fists or a silenced weapon, and use utilities to distract them. It is a formula the game has mastered and it is easy to pick up. One big bonus is that there are not really any frustrating “railroad” moments where players constantly fail due to weird level design. There is always a way forward that is made fairly obvious to players. A little more difficulty would have been nice, but it was good to not have any frustrating delays in the action.

Once the bullets start flying, things really get fun. Gunplay has been hit or miss across the franchise but Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 really nails the feel. Swapping from a silenced pistol to a powerful assault rifle feels noticeably different and encourages using different weapons found along the way. This also translates really well to multiplayer, and it is encouraging that Treyarch once again nailed the vital gunplay feel across multiple modes.

One major addition to the campaign is the safehouse. The safehouse is an upgradable base that the main team is stationed out of. Players are tasked early on with finding money during the missions in order to upgrade parts of the base. These upgrades can unlock smaller character moments but also provide vital in-game upgrades like more ammo and utilities.

Introducing the safehouse organically and making it flow with the story encourages players to invest in upgrading the base. There are puzzles located around the house that are fun to discover and solve and give players some nice rewards. Seeing the house slowly change over time is nice too and makes it feel like it is an actual, functioning base and not just a placeholder location.

All of this combines to really make players feel like a Black Ops agent. There is a wide variety of missions and objectives that let players explore the whole secret agent gamut. There is so much thrown at players across the 10-hour campaign that there is rarely ever any time to breathe. That feeling amplifies the chaotic nature of the story and mixes together in a near-perfect adventure.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 is a return to form and gives a great blend of action, intrigue, and beautiful chaos. It is exactly what the franchise has been missing and is a wonderful continuation of the Black Ops storyline all while setting the stage for the story to continue.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 was released October 24, 2024 on most platforms, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, and PC, free for Xbox Game Pass subscribers with an active subscription.