Call of Duty: Black Ops: Cold War is the first Call of Duty game I have bought and played in 5 years, so, what's new?
Noah Caldwell Gervais' videos on the Call of Duty series focus mostly (almost exclusively) on the single player modes, but those videos are probably the most comprehensive and clear look at the progression of the franchise. World War II first person shooting games started with the tonally bombastic, if mechanically thin, power fantasy of Wolfenstein 3D. Games like Medal of Honor subdued the power fantasy into something a bit more Hollywood, but it was still in the forefront. Call of Duty initially set itself apart from other shooters, and earned itself a place in the market, by being tonally distinct. When it had explored this, it then separated itself by being distinct in its setting with the original Modern Warfare.
Around the time that the Treyarch games began to develop a continuing narrative and Modern Warfare turned into a trilogy, Call of Duty began to set itself apart from the rest of the market by dominating it with advertising campaigns of unbelievable budget, and by fine tuning the games' sound design and reward structure. Plant the seed of potential transaction into as many people as possible, and deliver to those buyers the most viscerally satisfying first person skinner box that you possibly could.
The main complaint that I saw people have about Call of Duty around this time was that while the screeching guitar riffs that played during weapon unlocks were somewhat exciting, the game beneath the reward structure was neither tactically deep nor tactilely engaging. In the years that followed, making more interesting additions to player movement became the priority: sliding, double jumping, wall-running, grappling. I don't really know if I would say a ton has been done to improve tactics, but I suppose there are definitely maps with clear MOBA-esque lane layouts, so that's something.
To justify the more exaggerated movements of wall-running and double jumping, the series drifted into a more near-future science fiction setting, which recent entries like WWII and the Modern Warfare reboot seem to be distancing themselves from. Cold War continues this trend. While some fans of the series didn't particularly care for the sci-fi setting, and while remnants of the more tactile style of play still exist (crouch sliding is alive and well), I would guess that Activision had no problem backpedaling over the years from their decision to make the games' character controls more immediately engaging.
Playing Cold Wars multiplayer for the first time, I was shocked by how many of the maps I recognized from older Call of Duty games despite having not played in half a decade. Most of the gameplay changes are rather minor, Call of Duty is still more or less the same game that it has been for over a decade now.
The biggest change is obvious before the player even enters their first match. The UI of Call of Duty games from a decade ago was surprisingly minimal given the game's tone. Picking modes and customizing loadouts in the Modern Warfare trilogy in particular were done through menus that only rarely took up more than half of the screen, with most space dedicating to a simple smoke effect over a flat background. The main reason for this probably had less to do with artistic intent, and more to do with keeping the menus snappy to let PS3 and Xbox 360 players into matches as quickly as possible. Things are different now, one might say war has changed (I'm so freaking lord-darned funny for saying this).
Cold War's menu is overwhelmingly cumbersome and bloated. Most of the screenspace is initially dedicated to showing a 3D render of the player's avatar walking through a warzone. Older Call of Duty games didn't even really offer player customization aside from gun camouflage, but with the addition of paid cosmetic DLC, showing off the player's appearance has become a priority. The menu is split up into several horizontally oriented tabs, about half of which are mostly related to in-game purchases. I haven't really played an online shooter since I was in college, when I was really into CS:GO. I still didn't really know what a "battle pass" was until I played this game. The game never really explains enough about its menu design or jargon for me to feel like I truly grasp it. Initially its pretty unclear what costs real money and what doesn't, and I'm not convinced that this is anything other than intentional obfuscation.
The main way in which Call of Duty has changed in the past decade is that now that Call of Duty is a satisfying enough game to play, in terms of its base gameplay, reward structure, and cultural domination, each new game selling record numbers is basically a guarantee. How do you make more money than that? Part of the strategy is to offer a free option to the handful of people who were probably not buying in anyway in the form of Warzone. The other part is the paid microtransactions in the retail game, the battle pass possibly being the most interesting one.
The reward structure in older Call of Duty games had a clear limitation: eventually the player would run out of things to unlock. Players could "prestige" in order to reset their unlocks, but this was mostly just allowing them to superficially retrace their steps in order to hear the sound effects more often again. The battle pass and seasonal additions to new Call of Duty games do add new content, for a price.
In summary, Call of Duty now allows players to periodically reengage with the reward structure, for a fee. That's what's new.
Noah Caldwell Gervais' videos on the Call of Duty series focus mostly (almost exclusively) on the single player modes, but those videos are probably the most comprehensive and clear look at the progression of the franchise. World War II first person shooting games started with the tonally bombastic, if mechanically thin, power fantasy of Wolfenstein 3D. Games like Medal of Honor subdued the power fantasy into something a bit more Hollywood, but it was still in the forefront. Call of Duty initially set itself apart from other shooters, and earned itself a place in the market, by being tonally distinct. When it had explored this, it then separated itself by being distinct in its setting with the original Modern Warfare.
Around the time that the Treyarch games began to develop a continuing narrative and Modern Warfare turned into a trilogy, Call of Duty began to set itself apart from the rest of the market by dominating it with advertising campaigns of unbelievable budget, and by fine tuning the games' sound design and reward structure. Plant the seed of potential transaction into as many people as possible, and deliver to those buyers the most viscerally satisfying first person skinner box that you possibly could.
The main complaint that I saw people have about Call of Duty around this time was that while the screeching guitar riffs that played during weapon unlocks were somewhat exciting, the game beneath the reward structure was neither tactically deep nor tactilely engaging. In the years that followed, making more interesting additions to player movement became the priority: sliding, double jumping, wall-running, grappling. I don't really know if I would say a ton has been done to improve tactics, but I suppose there are definitely maps with clear MOBA-esque lane layouts, so that's something.
To justify the more exaggerated movements of wall-running and double jumping, the series drifted into a more near-future science fiction setting, which recent entries like WWII and the Modern Warfare reboot seem to be distancing themselves from. Cold War continues this trend. While some fans of the series didn't particularly care for the sci-fi setting, and while remnants of the more tactile style of play still exist (crouch sliding is alive and well), I would guess that Activision had no problem backpedaling over the years from their decision to make the games' character controls more immediately engaging.
Playing Cold Wars multiplayer for the first time, I was shocked by how many of the maps I recognized from older Call of Duty games despite having not played in half a decade. Most of the gameplay changes are rather minor, Call of Duty is still more or less the same game that it has been for over a decade now.
The biggest change is obvious before the player even enters their first match. The UI of Call of Duty games from a decade ago was surprisingly minimal given the game's tone. Picking modes and customizing loadouts in the Modern Warfare trilogy in particular were done through menus that only rarely took up more than half of the screen, with most space dedicating to a simple smoke effect over a flat background. The main reason for this probably had less to do with artistic intent, and more to do with keeping the menus snappy to let PS3 and Xbox 360 players into matches as quickly as possible. Things are different now, one might say war has changed (I'm so freaking lord-darned funny for saying this).
Cold War's menu is overwhelmingly cumbersome and bloated. Most of the screenspace is initially dedicated to showing a 3D render of the player's avatar walking through a warzone. Older Call of Duty games didn't even really offer player customization aside from gun camouflage, but with the addition of paid cosmetic DLC, showing off the player's appearance has become a priority. The menu is split up into several horizontally oriented tabs, about half of which are mostly related to in-game purchases. I haven't really played an online shooter since I was in college, when I was really into CS:GO. I still didn't really know what a "battle pass" was until I played this game. The game never really explains enough about its menu design or jargon for me to feel like I truly grasp it. Initially its pretty unclear what costs real money and what doesn't, and I'm not convinced that this is anything other than intentional obfuscation.
The main way in which Call of Duty has changed in the past decade is that now that Call of Duty is a satisfying enough game to play, in terms of its base gameplay, reward structure, and cultural domination, each new game selling record numbers is basically a guarantee. How do you make more money than that? Part of the strategy is to offer a free option to the handful of people who were probably not buying in anyway in the form of Warzone. The other part is the paid microtransactions in the retail game, the battle pass possibly being the most interesting one.
The reward structure in older Call of Duty games had a clear limitation: eventually the player would run out of things to unlock. Players could "prestige" in order to reset their unlocks, but this was mostly just allowing them to superficially retrace their steps in order to hear the sound effects more often again. The battle pass and seasonal additions to new Call of Duty games do add new content, for a price.
In summary, Call of Duty now allows players to periodically reengage with the reward structure, for a fee. That's what's new.