Note: This review specifically covers the Zombies mode in Call of Duty: Black Ops 6. For our thoughts on the other modes, see our Single player campaign overview or our multiplayer review in progress.
Have you ever wondered how we got here? Not in an existential question: “Where do we come from?” kind of way, but more specifically “how did a one-shot, co-op survival mode turn into a video game that put quotes about the horrors of war on the screen when you died, into this?” 16 years later, it’s hard to reconcile what the original Nazi Zombies mode from 2008 was. World at war used to be with the excessive, Resident Evil 6-inspired camp party I played with red-eye for several hours late last night. I’m not saying all this in a bad way, mind you; Black Ops 6’s take on the mode is exciting and unique thanks to all the new movement mechanics and good map design. Zombies hasn’t been what it used to be in World at War for a while, and I have a lot more of this year’s version to play before I’m ready for my final review, but that one thought still hit me pretty hard, so ver: How did we get here, man?
Let’s rip this thing’s bloody guts out, shall we? Black Ops 6’s Zombies mode features two all-new maps: Terminus, a prison complex turned bio-research station, and Liberty Falls, a small West Virginia town whose slice of quaint Americana is about to test itself against The Worst Day Ever (spoiler: things don’t seem to be going well for the Americana). The story itself is a direct sequel to the 2020 Zombies campaign Black Ops Cold Warand if, like me, you’ve largely forgotten what happened in the intervening four years, there doesn’t seem to be much effort being made to catch you up. This means that you will hear a lot of dialogue filled with proper names could could be important or fun references, but instead I had to say “I vaguely remember that person” a little too often.
Mostly, I just wanted the voices in my ear (and the characters I was playing) to shut up. They have what I’m going to call the Modern Video Game Character Problem™, which is that they all talk too much – especially since half the time they’re just expressing their thoughts out loud. I’m not saying that each of them is a deeply annoying, terminally unfunny, extremely unpleasant person, but I’m not. not say that too. Their mid-fight banter seems like something pieced together from a Schwarzenegger film written by ChatGPT – I’m not expecting any poetry here, but at least give me Gears of War level banter, you know? All I can hear are lines like the one where someone complains about how the zombies make them so mad they “boil their piss” or how we need a mop to clean up all the brains, we splatter everywhere so much before I want to aim my weaponize my allies instead.
So the story is a mixed bag so far, but you know what it isn’t? The gameplay. The biggest change here is Omnimovement (Zombiemovement?), Black Ops 6’s complete overhaul of Call of Duty’s basic movement mechanics. You can sprint, slide and dive in any direction, and even link these movements together. You also have full 360-degree freedom of movement, which means you can do sick things like sprint backwards, do a retreating dive, mow down the zombies approaching you from every angle, and then get up and keep moving before they even but come close. near. We haven’t seen zombie-killing moves like this since Resident Evil 6, aside from a few suplexes here and there. (Dear Treyarch, please add suplexes. Love, Will.) Even if that means Treyarch misses out on perhaps the easiest post-launch patch-introduced layup, the point I’m making is that this feels goodand I like it. I like it very much.
I also like the cards themselves. I think I prefer Liberty Falls to Terminus so far because I appreciate its height, with extremely entertaining ziplines that allow you to zoom from rooftop to rooftop. I also enjoy the more traditional structure of “pay Essence to open doors and access new places” instead of Terminus’s “restore power to the generators and defend them from zombies so you can earn the ability to open doors.” open”, but that’s not to say that Terminus doesn’t do anything nice. At some point I found a small raft with an outboard motor that allowed me to go to the smaller islands around the main area. I died pretty quickly because when I landed on a beach a horde of zombies jumped out of the ground like a bunch of really angry undead cabbages, but c’est la vie, right? Is it undead? I don’t speak French.
I’m a bit more mixed on how the cards handle story progression. Based on what I’ve played so far, you don’t really do much “defending” in the Black Ops 6 version of zombies. Instead, you’re constantly on the move, unlocking new areas and trying to complete that map’s Main Quest during rounds. You can do this pretty much any way you want. In my experience, that means a lot of running for your life and trying to earn enough Essence (which you get from defeating zombies) to open the way to the next area, buy a new weapon, or upgrade a weapon you like in a Pack. -a-Punch Machine, which does exactly what it sounds like. Treyarch plans to offer an optional, more guided, story-focused version of the mode later to preserve the sanctity of the Easter egg hunt (whatever that means) – which will disable Easter eggs and side missions, but I wish that this was here now so I could see what difference it makes. These maps are very large, and as someone with an absolutely terrible sense of direction, I like to get an idea of where I am assumed to go and how to get there before focusing on optional stuff.
One thing I really don’t like, at least so far, is the meta-progression. You won’t unlock the ability to create your own loadouts until you reach level four, and even then you probably won’t have unlocked anything cool to customize with the weapons you have so far. Furthermore, the progression feels painfully slow; I reached level four after an hour and a half of playtime, which feels too long to wait for that basic functionality. I’ve only been playing solo so far, which has definitely slowed me down, but the slowdown still doesn’t feel great. Additionally, the lack of customization early on made my runs (two at Liberty Falls, one at Terminus) feel monotonous in a way I didn’t like. Hopefully playing with friends will solve this problem, but it’s something I’ll be wary of as I continue.
There’s a lot I haven’t covered yet, like map progression and upgrades (my first impression is actually “there might be too many mechanics here”), so I want to spend more time with this year’s Zombies mode before I put the finishing touches. this review and rate it sometime next week. Right now I’m excited to play more, and still in awe of how we got here. Undeath sure is strange, huh soldier?
