Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Campaign Review

ign.com:

Note: This review specifically covers the single-player campaign of Call of Duty: Black Ops 6. For our thoughts on the other modes, see our multiplayer review in progress – and for Zombies, stand by!

A spy thriller worthy of the name, Call of Duty: Black Ops 6's campaign is a hugely welcome reinvigoration of the long-running first-person shooter series. It looks back at what has historically made the best CoD single-player modes so great and throws its own exciting and novel ideas into the mix, to fantastic effect. Telling one of the most engaging stories the series has ever seen, Black Ops 6’s enticing variety and impressive scale provide a stellar return to form.

Ever since the 2003 original, CoD campaigns have been heavily influenced by military action movies – starting in a logical place with classic WW2 cinema like The Longest Day and Saving Private Ryan before moving on to more contemporary influences, in particular the panoramic yet still claustrophobic camerawork of Ridley Scott's Black Hawk Down.

But the lens shifted focus away from theatres of full-scale war and onto spy thrillers in the mold of the Mission: Impossible and Bourne series, beginning with 2010’s Black Ops and evolving into a refined, enthralling form with Black Ops 6. It’s in this distinctive direction that the returning Adler and Woods team up with a new team of skilled operators, this time in 1991, to combat an emerging new threat called The Pantheon, amid rumors of the creation of a potentially history-changing bioweapon. Sure, 2020's Cold War had its fair share of espionage action, but the majority of Black Ops 6's missions don't take place on the flashes and bangs of the frontline, but in the shadows that lie deep behind it.

Two missions in particular showcase this brilliantly: the infiltration of a political gala in Most Wanted, and the casino heist of High Rollers. The former presents three different options for how you want to go about completing your objective - I had a great time