Call of Duty: Black Ops Launch Center

Written by Chris Boots-Faubert for SuperCheats.com

Introduction and Synopsis

The seventh installment in the Call of Duty series (and the third developed by game studio Treyarch), Call of Duty: Black Ops is set during the Cold War Era, and features the player as a special forces operative engaged in black operations behind enemy lines. Previous games in the series were set in the World War II era and the Gulf War era -- this is the first game that is based upon events of the Cold War era.

The game includes four distinct operational theaters -- the Ural Mountains, Cuba, Vietnam, and Laos, and features two main characters: Alex Mason, and Jason Hudson. Both are members of the Studies and Observations Group of the Military Assistance Command: Vietnam (AKA MACV-SOG), a highly-classified multi-service special operations unit established by the Joint Chiefs of the United States that conducted covert unconventional warfare operations prior to and during the war in Vietnam.

The unit, which participated in practically every significant campaign during the Vietnam War, was a melting pot of United States Army Special Forces, United States Navy SEALS, United States Air Force Combat Control Teams, United States Marine Corps Force Recon units, and agents of the Central Intelligence Agency, and most of its operations in the Vietnam Theater remain classified to this day.

Game Play

COD: Black Ops is a First-Person Shooter with a single-player story mode that is similar in its construction to those of previous games in the series. The player will play as different characters as the campaign progresses, each placed as a unique character within the sub-plot of the story line as it relates to them. Cinematic Cut Scene elements are combined with special effects like Bullet-Time and flashbacks to generate a higher level of tension and excitement, and the robust online multi-player mode includes fan-popular features established in COD4: Modern Warfare that were removed from following versions of the series.

While Black Ops falls within the usual play style of FPS games, it includes elements first introduced in Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, which had the player providing support and direction for a unit on the ground from the relative safety of the gunner's seat of an AC-130 gunship, taking out enemy troops from above using a combination of heavy automatic weapons and cannons. In Black Ops, the player will pilot -- and fight from -- a Russian MIL MI-24 Attack Helicopter (designated as the "Hind" by NATO), and provide direction and logistics for ground forces from the cockpit of an SR-71 Blackbird spy plane -- elements that will doubtlessly be popular with gamers.

The single-player campaign (or story mode) features a set of objective-based missions, and bucks the trend in modern games of focusing all of the attention on the multi-player side of combat gaming by providing particular care and attention to its story line and sub-plots.

The online multi-player mode includes elements that were first introduced in COD4, like the unlock-able reward system, experience points, upgrade perks, and fully-customizable weapons. With an emphasis upon social play, an interactive currency system (called "COD Points") has been introduced through which players can purchase weapons as well as kit upgrades, among other things, and features a gambling system called "Wager Match" as well as a "Contracts" system that allows the player to take on special time-limited tasks in order to acquire more money.

Dedicated servers return to the game, as does Lean, the developer's console, mod tools, and dedicated servers. Due to the wild popularity of cheating during play on the PC platform, the PC version of Black Ops will be exclusively hosted on the Steam service, which has implemented its Valve Anti-Cheat System to provide a more enjoyable play experience for players.

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Street Date: 9 November 2010
Publisher: Activision
Developer: Treyarch
Focus: Single Player Story / Multi-Player Online
Platforms: XBox 360 / Windows / PS3 / Wii
Genre: First-Person Shooter
Official Content Ratings: ESRB Rating: M (Contains content that might be considered unsuitable for people under 17 years of age) BBFC: 15 (Suitable only for those aged 15 and over. )