When you fire up a Call of Duty game for campaign mode, you pretty much know what you’re in for. Guerilla warfare with impressionable characters and motives that dictate the lives of millions. The protagonist never or rarely speaks and is integral in saving the free world by killing hundreds of baddies. There’s a flight level. A stealth level. It doesn’t last long but it’s replayable. It’s a standard affair but cranked up to eleven with a huge budget and explosions everywhere.

Black Ops: Cold War carries on the legacy of developer Treyarch crafting a cohesive timeline, seeing the return of Frank Woods, Jason Hudson, and Alex Mason as integral characters. Woods’ voice actor wasn’t able to return, stirring a controversy before the game’s release. Although new VA Damon Victor Allen does a bang-up job of sounding gruff and badass, whereas Hudson’s cold/calculated demeanor make him a feverish ally. Seeing familiar faces once again is a treat.

This leads to you being a new character with the alias of “Bell”, a previous KGB operative and now double-agent. You have the choice of inserting a name for Bell, as well as determining two distinct combat advantages tied to personality traits. I opted to give Bell a 25% boost in rate of fire, as well as the ability to move faster while aiming down sights, both of which made the hyper pace of gunplay present in most Call of Duty titles more manageable.

Missions in the campaign are tied to an evidence board. Tasked with finding a man named Perseus during the tumultuous Cold War era of the early 1980s (directly after the original Black Ops game), there are even side missions based on evidence/intel you find in the mainline missions. What I found the most intriguing was that these side missions necessitate you to do some actual code-cracking. You can’t just look online for the solution, as it’s unique to every user’s campaign and requires a complex solution method.

The AI in the campaign is quite competent, meaning you can’t just blow through the formidable militia ahead of you. Thanks to kiting, ammo management, and playing defensively, I only found myself dying a handful of times from start to finish. Black Ops: Cold War is free of moments where I’d feel stuck, whether by my own skill or by bad level design. Speaking of level design, no two locales are the same, and it’s a pleasure to see multiplayer not borrow from any of them as they did in previous games.

Obviously, I wish experiences like these could last much longer than the ~5 hours that they do, but now I’m dying to replay the other games in the Black Ops series. Raven Software, who was responsible for the campaign portion, deserves serious accolades and so do the other stellar studios, Beenox and High Moon, that helped with other portions of the game. This is an easy recommendation for anyone who’s a fan of strong first-person shooter campaigns, even if the words Call of Duty leave a bad taste in their mouth.

A PC review copy of Call of Duty Black Ops: Cold War was provided by Activision for this review.

Phenixx Gaming is everywhere you are. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Instagram.

Also, if you’d like to join the Phenixx Gaming team, check out our recruitment article for details on working with us.

Phenixx Gaming is proud to be a Humble Partner! Purchases made through our affiliate links support our writers and charity!

Call of Duty Black Ops: Cold War

$59.99

9

Score

9.0/10

Pros

• Massive Production Value
• Gorgeous Setpieces
• More Than Just Shooting Guns

Cons

• A Short Affair, as Usual