First of all, I missed out on the last couple of weeks because I was on holiday. I was amazed that I actually got a review posted at all with Assassins Creed 3. Now that I'm back, however, it's time to jump straight in with Black Ops 2. Yes, it's that time of year again: will Black Ops just repeat the successes and shortcomings of its predecessors or will it go above and beyond to bring some much needed freshness to the somewhat stagnant franchise.
STORY
Straight off the bat, Black Ops II surprises with it's story, set in a surprisingly believable near future with a somewhat sympathetic, yet easy to hate villain. It's the first CoD I can remember that tries to tackle some of the horrors and mistakes of war without making it feel like it's just there for shock value.
Set in the year 2025, you control David Mason, son of Black Ops' protagonist Alex Mason, as he and his JSOC squad try to capture the leader of Cordis Die, Raul Menendez. During the campaign, you also play as Frank Woods, and Alex Mason in flashback missions, detailing some of Menendez's past and his involvement in the Mason family history.
The historical jumping around could have been terribly confusing, but it's handled well, and the story isn't affected badly by it. It's by far the best CoD story since Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare.
PRESENTATION
Despite running on the same engine for so many years, Black Ops 2 manages to still look quite impressive. The colour range seems to have increased however, with one particular mission in the Cayman Islands standing out in my memory, just because it was so bright and colourful. Way better than the usual grayish brown levels.
Character animations remain smooth and clear, and facial animations in particular have increased in quality; it's most noticable in cutscenes, with wider ranges of emotion being shown than in any previous game in the series.
The adrenaline pumping score keeps up with the action on screen and the theme (composed by Trent Reznor of NiN fame) is pretty cool too. All in all, Blacks ops 2 is presented quite well. I'm still not sure that it's not time for an engine upgrade.
GAMEPLAY
As with every year, Call of Duty has delivered once again with some of the most solid gameplay mechanics in the FPS genre. If you've played a game in the franchise previously, then it'll all be very familiar. The action runs at a smooth 60 fps, theres a wide variety of loadouts to customize, and the AI is intelligent enough to provide a decent challenge.
The biggest change this year, at least as far as the campaign goes, is the level of customization. This year, you're able to customize your loadout before each mission, allowing you to try out a new piece of kit in each assignment. And the gear is all really cool, from target finding scopes, to collapsible stocks, to silencers, to scopes that provide an almost radar like view, showing you heat signatures through walls. Near future tech is sweet!
Continuing on the theme of choice, there are branching paths in the campaign, as well as multiple endings, all depending on the choices you make, conscious or not. Some choices are binary, allowing you the chance to kill or capture a target. Some are less voluntary: allowing a target to escape, instead of killing him and securing his hostage.
So to sum up the big changes to the CoD formula, I would say it's all about player choice. What gear you take into battle, how the story is affected. It's all up to you.
MULTIPLAYER
Instead of replayability, for this I'd like to mention the Multiplayer. The maps are nicely varied, the guns are cool, everything works as you'd expect. The big new feature is called Pick 10, and I'd like to praise it's inclusion. Creating classes with preset fields (main weapon, secondary, 3 perks, etc) is all well and good, but true customization is available when you can go without certain things, so you can add more features to your class. It allows for true personalization and flexibility with the multiplayer.
Add to that some robust zombie modes, where teams travel around multiple maps in search of clues, or grief each other, and you have more than enough reasons to come back to Black Ops 2.
OVERVIEW
If Black Ops 2 had only improved it's narrative, I'd recommend the hell out of it. As it turns out, however, it does so much more than that. It puts the focus on you, whether in the campaign, or the multiplayer. It puts itself in your hands and says "go wild". And you will. And you'll love it.
Next week, Playstation Allstars Battle Royale. Or Halo 4. Or Hitman Absolution. I don't actually know.
See you next time!
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