So you had Infinity Ward pumping out Modern Warfare while Treyarch tossed out the Black Ops titles, and it was great. The most notable example was when Infinity Ward put out the first Modern Warfare and then Treyarch followed up the next year with World at War which-while a respectable game-came off as a throwback to the series’ earlier World War II days when all people really wanted was more Modern Warfare.īut the odd two/three-studio development cycle also resulted in something I found kind of fascinating about Call of Duty: Each studio made something different-at least on the singleplayer side. Flashing forward to 2025 allowed Treyarch to imbue your actions in the past with some sort of future repercussions. If I tolerated the 2025 portion of Black Ops II, it was because it was tied so well into the overarching story of Alex Mason, the protagonist of the original game (and the star of the second game’s 1980s section). Similarly, I loved the 1980s portion of Black Ops II, which somehow crafted a compelling shooter from the morass of late-era Cold War posturing-Noriega, the Russian war in Afghanistan, the US aimlessly throwing money at guerrillas. It took an interesting look at some conflicts that previously were thought of as “off-limits” for the shooter genre by striking a balance between the typical Call of Duty bombast and something slightly more self-reflective and shadowy.
As a Cold War buff (Seriously: It’s the era I wrote my undergrad history thesis on), I really loved Black Ops. I have to wonder though if there’s more to Black Ops III than what we’ve seen.
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