| Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Gameplay & Story | Release Date | Pre-Order & DLC | Review |
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 is the latest entry to one of the most successful video game franchises of all time, and is the first mainline Black Ops entry since 2020. Read our review to see what it did well, what it didn't do well, and if it's worth buying.
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Review Overview
What is Call of Duty: Black Ops 6?
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 is a FPS game that tweaks its award-winning formula by a little bit and makes things a little bit more fast-paced with omnidirectional movement. There’s quite a lot to unpack here, so let’s dive into the review.
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 features:
⚫︎ Faster-paced run and gun FPS gameplay familiar to all CoD veterans.
⚫︎ A thrilling Campaign Mode filled with action, espionage, conspiracy, and clever twists.
⚫︎ Stunning graphics, breathtaking spectacles, and ultra-realistic cinematics.
⚫︎ Exhilarating round-based Zombies mode.
⚫︎ Classic Call of Duty multiplayer with a variety of maps, game modes, mechanics, weapons, etc.
⚫︎ High quality sound effects and flawless voice acting.
For more gameplay details, read everything we know about Call of Duty: Black Ops 6's gameplay and story.
 Steam |
 PlayStation |
 Xbox |
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| $69.99 | |||||
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Pros & Cons
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
 Creative, Memorable, and Enjoyable Campaign Top-notch FPS Gameplay, Graphics, and Audio Zombies Mode Is Fun Again Available On Game Pass |
Long Grind for Weapons and Camos Campaign Is Relatively Short Some Minor Bugs Skill-Based Matchmaking Makes Every Multiplayer Match So Sweaty |
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Overall Score - 86/100
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 is one of the best Call of Duty games in recent years, complete with an actually fun and memorable Campaign, a Zombies Mode that follows the original tried and tested round-based formula, and your typical CoD multiplayer experience. As we’ve come to expect from this franchise, its gameplay, audio, and visuals are among the best in the genre. However, long-time issues that have plagued the franchise for years like cheating and Skill-Based Matchmaking still remain for now.
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Story - 8/10
Black Ops 6’s campaign mode reminds me a lot of the original Call of Duty: Black Ops game from over a decade ago. It’s a mystery that slowly unfolds with every mission, delivering smart twists, high octane action and spectacle, and memorable moments. The story itself isn’t quite as good as the original Black Ops, but it’s around the same level and feels like a blockbuster action movie. Given the improved gameplay, Black Ops 6’s campaign definitely plays better than the original.
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Gameplay - 9/10
Call of Duty’s gameplay has always been the best-feeling when talking about run and gun style FPS games. Like with every entry, it’s filled with fast-paced action and responsive gunplay. The Campaign feels amazing to play and really puts you in the shoes of elite soldiers going through perilous missions, the Zombies Mode is an intense survival experience, and the Multiplayer Mode is your typical CoD competitive battlegrounds. Call of Duty games will almost always deliver on excellent gameplay, and this one is no exception.
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Visuals - 9/10
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6’s visuals are superb. The graphics in-game are great, but the visual quality of the cinematics is phenomenal. Visibility is great and there was never a time in my playthrough where I thought it was too dark or too bright, even in the darker maps like Zombies’ Terminus. Maps are well-designed, the spectacles will make your eyes widen in awe, and the overall visual quality helps keep you immersed in its digital war zone.
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Audio - 9/10
Just like with its visuals, this game’s audio is very well-crafted. The sound effects are great and things sound exactly how they should, from a shotgun blast, people screaming in pain, a helicopter closing in, zombies wailing from a distance, and everything in between. The voice acting in this game is also very well done, contributing to the game’s immersion and campaign experience.
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Value for Money - 8/10
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 is priced at $69.99. Some players might find excellent value at that price, while some probably won’t, especially if they’re only in it for the campaign as it’s relatively short. What bumps this score up is how the game is available on both Xbox and PC Game Pass, allowing for free access as long as you have the subscription. Gone are the days of having to pay $70 each time a new Call of Duty game is released, unless you’re on PlayStation of course.
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Review: Bullets and Brilliance
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 is a game that I didn’t expect too much from. I thought it would be your typical Call of Duty release that’ll deliver on great FPS gameplay, visuals, and audio like they always do for $70 each year, while not expecting too much from the Campaign and the Zombies Mode. Boy was I blown away.
The game looks, sounds, and plays like a Call of Duty game, and that’s a compliment since it’s made a name for itself as one of the leaders in the genre. Like with most Call of Duty releases, the visuals and audio are top-notch, and so is the gameplay. These three work together to give players an exceptional FPS experience. The guns look detailed, sound lifelike, and feel awesome to shoot. Performing takedowns on opponents make you feel like John Wick thanks to the fluid choreography, graphic visuals, and the cracking sound you hear as you crack an enemy combatant’s neck. The game’s overall enjoyment factor and quality are highly influenced by these three things, which Call of Duty did a great job with like they always do.
One major gameplay change they added to this game is the new omnidirectional movement that allows you to sprint, jump, and dive in all directions, which makes the game a little bit more fast-paced than it usually did. In previous titles, you could only sprint moving forward, and whenever you’d try to dive or slide sideways or backwards you’d end up just crouching. It takes a while to get used to, but once you get the hang of it you’ll start feeling a lot more agile. Pro tip: as soon as you get into the game, turn on the hit markers. For some reason, the default setting has this on off, but you’ll be able to play so much better knowing when your shots land and when your opponents actually die.
Short But Sweet Campaign
Right from the get-go, the campaign starts off with a bang, and was interesting from the very beginning. It’s a story that’s connected to the other Black Ops games with a mix of mostly fresh and some familiar faces. The strong cast consists of retired badass Black Ops veteran Frank Woods, Black Ops deuteragonist and sometimes antagonist Russel Adler, Woods’ protégé Troy Marshall, CIA operations specialist Jane Harrow, Stasi defector and tech expert Felix Neumann, former Avalon assassin Sevati "Sev" Dumas, and rogue Black Ops member with a mysterious past, William "Case" Calderon, who you’ll play as for most of the game’s campaign. Each character has distinct personalities that make each one interesting, and each one is perfectly voice acted as well.
As for the story, it’s very reminiscent of the original Black Ops game with a mystery that slowly unfolds as you make discoveries with every mission. It’s hard to talk about it without spoiling anything, so I’ll be very vague except about parts shown in the trailers. The barebones plot is that a dangerous and highly-trained multi-national paramilitary organization with bad intentions has infiltrated the higher levels of the CIA. You assemble a crew to investigate and go rogue since you don’t know who to trust, and try to get to the bottom of it. It’s not only very intriguing, but it also makes you feel a sense of danger given how it’s just you and your crew against the entire CIA and paramilitary group.
The game has 11 missions in total. Most of them are action-packed, and a lot of them are filled with spectacular action sequences that the likes of James Bond, John Wick, and Bryan Mills from Taken would approve of. Some parts of the campaign were admittedly quite slow and not as entertaining, though there weren’t any missions where I was completely bored. Even the more tame missions had its very interesting and intense moments. The catch here is that it’s quite short, only at around 7 or 8 hours long. The quality makes up for how it’s so short, and there’s tons of things to do in Multiplayer and Zombies after you finish the campaign anyway.
The good Call of Duty campaigns often had extremely memorable and epic moments that you remember even after more than a decade after playing the game. For me it was escaping Vorkuta and learning about what the numbers meant in the original Black Ops, storming Normandy in WWII, running away from the Eiffel Tower as it collapses in MW3, and a couple more. BO6’s campaign has a couple of missions that might just be as memorable. Sadly they’re something I can’t talk about much since part of why they’re so memorable is because they’re clever twists that’ll likely catch you off guard.
Overall, the campaign was a very enjoyable experience that had its fair share of spectacle and memorable moments. Its only flaws are how it might be too short for a lot of people, and how I encountered a few bugs that never wasted more than a minute of my time. There were also times when I didn’t know where to go and that I’d be stuck wandering around or repeatedly dying because it didn’t show the objective marker. Again, just minor inconveniences that didn’t waste too much of my time.
Familiar CoD Multiplayer
As for the multiplayer, it’s pretty much your standard CoD multiplayer experience. The only major change is how players can now move with more agility, given the omnidirectional movement. There’s more ways to approach combat now given this mobility overhaul, so you’ll definitely feel more capable on that aspect of combat. However, this can also be said for the other players you’ll come up against, so skilled players can be very challenging to kill if you’re new to the game or just rusty.
Skill-based matchmaking (SBMM) is here once again, so expect most lobbies to be extremely competitive. If you’re new to the franchise and don’t understand why a lot of players think SBMM is bad, it’s a system that pairs people together based on how well they play. Beginners are sure to benefit from this as they’ll face off with people who also aren’t very good. However, for average players and the elite, which make up most of the playerbase, it makes every match a hyper-competitive sweatfest to the point where you can rarely play multiplayer casually to just relax and have a good time, especially if you care about your stats.
If you could get behind the SBMM like CoD players do every year anyway, there’s a lot of content to grind for and to keep you busy. On one hand, it can be quite annoying to have to grind for player EXP and weapon EXP just to be able to unlock them and equip the best attachments. However, the camo challenges can be a fun side quest to accomplish just to earn the mastery camo you want to use and flex. It’s the same familiar camo system we’ve come to know and love.
The Prestige system is another thing that will keep players engaged as they rise through the ranks. How it works is that when you reach the max level, you can go for Prestige 1 by resetting your player rank and progressing through the Prestige 1 ranks. This goes on until Prestige 10 and each Prestige rank gives you new goodies like blueprints, operator skins, and more. There’s more to this of course, but this is just the gist of it.
Oorah For Round Based Zombies
The Zombies Mode was another thing that caught me off guard because I wasn’t expecting much out of it. I knew it was bringing back the round based formula that made it popular in the first place, but MW3’s take on the Zombies mode last year left a sour taste in my mouth that I didn’t expect anything from this one. I’m happy to say that I was wrong and it was actually some of the most fun I had in the hours I’ve spent on this game so far.
Zombies has two maps that you could play solo if you dare, with friends, or with random matchmade allies. Both of them are well designed in my opinion, but a lot of the playerbase so far have been more drawn to the Terminus map. Both maps have a main quest that you can progress through with little guidance, leaving you to figure things out on your own. Unlock paths and explore the huge maps, restore power, buy weapons, amp them up, all while you slay hordes of the undead monstrosities trying to end your life.
Again, everything about the Zombies game mode was spot-on in my opinion, and reminded me a lot of how I used to feel about the original Zombies maps like Kino der Toten and Tranzit. Once again, the top-notch gameplay, visuals, and audio work together to give you a creepy and adrenaline-fueled undead-slaying adventure. The dark ambiance, eerie enemy unit designs, and the creepy frenzied screams all work together to give you an exhilarating zombie experience, especially during the later rounds where you inevitably get swarmed by dozens, or even hundreds of zombies at a time.
Is Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Worth It?
Yes, Especially If You Have The Game Pass.
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 provides its players with a highly enjoyable experience across all three of its game modes. It has its flaws like the story being relatively short and the SBMM making it hard to find a casual laid-back multiplayer match. But the overall quality of its gameplay, visuals, and audio all harmoniously working together to give you an immersive and exhilarating FPS experience drowns out its flaws. On top of that, you’ll never run out of things to grind for in this game, making it great for completionists who try to earn most or all unlockable content..
Finally, it’s available on both PC and Xbox Game Pass, making it free for everyone who already has a subscription or giving players the option to just subscribe for a much cheaper fee than $70. Sadly, players on PlayStation do not have this option.
| Steam |
PlayStation |
Xbox |
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| $69.99 | |||||
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 FAQ
What are the code to the safes?
There are different types of safes across the different missions and game modes of Call of Duty Black Ops 6. You may find the code you’re looking for with the button link below.
How Do You Solve The Piano Puzzle?
You’ll need to do a couple of things first like fix the boiler room generator. It’s quite complicated to explain here, so check out our guide for the Piano Puzzle with the link below.
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Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Product Information
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| Title | CALL OF DUTY: BLACK OPS 6 |
|---|---|
| Release Date | October 25, 2024 |
| Developer | Treyarch, Raven Software, Beenox, High Moon Studios, Activision Shanghai, Sledgehammer Games, Infinity Ward, Demonware |
| Publisher | Activision |
| Supported Platforms | PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, PC (Steam) |
| Genre | first-person shooter |
| Number of Players | Single-player, Online PvP, Online Co-op, Cross-Platform Multiplayer |
| ESRB Rating | RP |
| Official Website | Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Website |
