Activision and Treyarch's latest first-person shooter video game, Call of Duty Black Ops II is now available for the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and Microsoft Windows with a Wii U version set to release on Nov. 18 when the new system launches.
The early reviews for the military game are in and Black Ops II has received mostly mixed reviews. Lets start out with the good. According to IGN, "While large portions of the design conform to the tenets established by prior iterations of the franchise, the unparalleled wealth of gameplay options and brilliant twists on the formula have shaped Black Ops II into the most ambitious and exciting Call of Duty ever made." IGN scores the new game a 9.3-out-of-10.
The vide game website Joystiq praised Black Ops II's multiplayer mode but called its single player story lackluster. Joystiq said, "Multiplayer is king in Black Ops 2, offering plenty of in-game and inherent rewards for its ravenous online community. It's paired with a lackluster story that fails the ambition shown by the branching campaign, reflecting the overall game's forward-thinking but imperfectly executed ideas." Joystiq gave the game four-out-of-five stars.
Here is what Game Informer had to say, "For shooter fans that don't require as deep of a dive, Black Ops II's multiplayer may feel like more of the same. No significant new match types are present, and the Pick 10 system doesn't drastically change the gameplay experience. Most of the changes to the Call of Duty formula come in campaign mode, and they are executed with mixed results." Game Informer scores the game an 8.5 -out-of-10.
GameSpot found the game to be stuck between innovation and stagnancy. GameSpot says, "the campaign hits the same satisfying rhythms, the multiplayer captures the same frenetic intensity, and the cooperative zombies mode delivers the same stale undead-massacring action." But the gaming site also offers Black Ops II some praise saying; "Black Ops II finds solid footing, providing another great ride on the Call of Duty rollercoaster."
The Official Xbox Magazine UK, also compliments the game's multiplayer mode saying that it is the best Call Of Duty Multiplayer mode since 2007. According to the Magazine, "The maps are fantastic, the guns are great, and the redesigned loadout system brings back the sense of clarity that has slowly been lost after years of incrementally piling on features." But the Magazine also find the single-player mode to be the game's biggest flaw. Here is what the Magazine said about the single-player campaign, "it's bafflingly inconsistent and by far the game's weakest feature. Things start promisingly, with the first two missions showing off impressive scale and some amazing future tech - but then it forgets about all its new toys and reverts to the predictable Call of Duty slog through generic war-torn cities watching increasingly bigger things explode." The game received an 8-out-of-10 from The Official Xbox Magazine UK.
Metacritic gave the Xbox 360 version of the game an average rating of 86-out-of-100 compared to 87 for the original Call of Duty: Black ops. The PlayStation 3 version has not received a score on the site yet.
What do you think about the reviews for the game? Does single-player campaign even matter when it comes to COD games? Do you buy the game for single-player? Comment in the section below...
