Games Inbox: Is Black Ops 6 the best Call Of Duty ever?

Let them cook
Personally, I have no interest in Dragon Age: The Veilguard. I’ve never liked any of the previous ones, regardless of the reviews, and so I don’t suppose I’ll like this one. I do love Mass Effect though and this makes me very optimistic that BioWare will do a good job of the new one.

Dragon Age: Inquisition was 10 years ago now but it’s also seven since Mass Effect Andromeda and 12 years since Mass Effect 3. BioWare used to one of the biggest developers around so even though it’s not for me I really hope Veilguard is a hit and it gives EA the confidence to just let BioWare get on with their thing.
Tacle

Beginner’s tips
I’ve been playing Call Of Duty online since Call Of Duty 3 on the PlayStation 3. I’m 38.

Black Ops 6 is good fun but it took a few hours for the multiplayer to click for me on my PlayStation 5.

Interesting to read people saying it’s full of sweaty lobbies. I have definitely noticed that the skill floor of players seems to have risen… either that or my age is catching up with me.

I’m still winning games and smashing opponents but for me any new Call Of Duty is about getting some new guns as quick as possible and levelling them up quick, so I have a slight advantage. That and learning the best parts of the map.

You can still decide from the map whether you should take a short, medium or long-range weapon and that can make a big difference.

Take advantage of these few easy weeks where there are loads of level 1 players.

Oh, and play an objective-based game. So much more fun and it helps you know where the enemies will be spawning from.

They also let you level up guns you may not use much in multiplayer through Zombies mode, which is nice.

Just a few thoughts.

Any GC’rs on PlayStation 5 feel free to add me.
Tommyfatfingers

Nice and dumb
Really enjoyed the Black Ops 6 campaign. The story is dumb but it doesn’t take itself too seriously and I appreciate that. I really like the variety and the kind of arcade style feel to it. It’s almost like a lightgun game but off-the-rails, and I mean that as a compliment.

Personally, I think the weirder missions are the best bit. The Control one is great and the final level is good too. For me, it’s definitely the best Call Of Duty of the generation, if not the last two.
Haymaker

Pros and cons
Having played Black Ops 6 for the past week now, it has been interesting reading different thoughts about it in the Inbox. For me, it has been enjoyable to play but not without its faults. I’ve really enjoyed it being on Game Pass, as it has meant I can play on both Xbox and PC without needing to pay for either.

Campaign: A definite improvement on previous entries but still not to the standard of a proper single-player game. Enjoyable enough to dip in and blast through though.

Multiplayer: Definitely some issues with spawns, aggravated by allowing 6×6 games on maps designed for 2v2 and 3v3. The larger maps seem to have so many overlapping fields of fire it can be very hard to make even the slightest movement out into the open before dying instantly. I’m the wrong side of 40 these days and I know I lose a lot of 1v1s where reaction time is everything.

I’m curious how items like elite controllers, with hair trigger locks or the ability to adjust dead zones, can impact reaction speed and aiming in games like this, especially as I only play hardcore so 22hp does not last long! I’ve been debating upgrading my controller but they’re in excess of £130 usually, which is a pretty steep price.

The reports around untraceable cheats also adds an element of doubt when watching a repeat of someone dropping five to six players in two seconds flat, while their aim swings instantly to a new target that was on their peripheral vision. On the whole I’ve enjoyed multiplayer, it has been a breath of fresh air to be able to play without the ridiculous skins that have dominated recent editions and made it look like Fortnite; sadly this won’t last I expect.

The game isn’t without its fair share of bugs, off the top of my head I’ve experienced:

• Editing loadout mid-game kept respawning me with the old loadout.
• I had one game where it thought I was rank 1, loaded me in with a default loadout and at the end of the game unlocked 120+ ranks and weapon/perk things.
• Occasional dead players flip-flopping around the map.
• Game loads in with a completely black screen – I’m in game, it’s going on around me, but I literally can’t see anything. Only fix is to close the app and launch it again. Apparently, a common enough issue and seems to happen at random, although only in the last two days for me.
• Occasional hard crash on Xbox, back to the main system.

The Season 1 battle pass starts in a couple of weeks, so multiplayer is going to get more varied and I wonder if we’ll get some new maps with maybe some spawn fixing. I know a lot of Inbox comments recently have been about how it is dominated by kids, but I honestly don’t think it is.

I think a lot of players will be 20+ these days, as the kids are still in Fortnite, FIFA, and so on. As a secondary school teacher I rarely hear any of the kids talking about Call Of Duty and it wouldn’t surprise me to find out a large proportion of players are 30+ and only playing because they always have.
Adam W.

GC: They’re not complaining about too many kids but a lack of casual players. Which matches with what you’re saying and the reader above.

Inbox also-rans
I don’t really get this Croc: Legend Of The Gobbos revisionism. It was rubbish back in the 90s so I dread to think how it’d play now. Nostalgia is a hell of a drug.
Freddy

I have to say that Nintendo music app is actually a lot better than I was expecting. Nintendo Switch Online is lowkey a great bargain. Much better than PS Plus, I’d say (it’s also cheaper).
Korbie